Changes the Future Holds
by xXDesertRoseXx
Summary: Post twilight;AU after twilight, Tony-centric. Tony takes some decesions that change his life for good. Kate IS alive but not there yet . Tate with some McAbby and Jen\Gibbs. Story MUCH better than summary.
1. AN

**Author's Note **

**Please read before going on with the story in order to properly understand the plot.**

O.K. first things first, this story DOES NOT ignore twilight completely. It begins in 2005 right after Ziva takes Kate's desk. The story is and will be Tony-centric. Although Kate is not dead, the only one who knows that is Ducky who performed her 'autopsy'. What exactly happened to her will be explained in latter chapters.

Tony in this story will be something between well… his normal self and a bit more sophisticated, smarter and sadder Tony (well, what did you expect? In this story Kate is the love of his life and he thinks she is dead).The story is off course completely AU for all episodes post Twilight (although some major cases will be mentioned) and though I know that Kate died a long time ago in NCIS I just miss the chemistry between her and Tony .With those said, on to the story!

**DISCLAIMER**; As much as I beg, I can't expect that I will ever own anyone of the amazing characters from NCIS… Anyways I can always give it a try… Could I pretty please own the NCIS characters, or at least Tony? Pleeeease (insert puppy dog eyes here)… No? Damn at least I tried… Well, as you might have already guessed, I don't own any of the NCIS characters mentioned in this fic.


	2. Thoughts and Decisions

**DISCLAIMER****;** I, sadly, don't own any of the NCIS characters that are mentioned in this fic.

**THOUGHTS AND DECISIONS**

November 2005

Tony's apartment; 2 in the morning;

'And like that another day goes by' Tony thought as he lay on his couch gazing at the pouring rain outside his window. By all means today, or probably yesterday since it was already two in the morning, should have been a great day at work. Nobody was injured, they had caught the bad guy, Gibbs hadn't hit the back of his head too hard and he had teased Probie (aka agent Timothy McGee) enough to make his day a bit happier. They even had a new case already.

'Oh, and Ziva took Kate's desk'. With that thought he stuffed his head to a pillow that surprisingly was still in its right place; actually **on **the couch. 'Why? Why the hell do I care so much? How can a simple desk have the power to make my day so damn miserable?' He let out a sigh, took the pillow of his head and continued pointlessly staring at the heavy rain and the lightnings as the storm outside kept raging on.

However, if he wanted to be true to himself, he knew exactly why it mattered so much to him. 'It's not the desk itself' he thought. 'It's the fact that Ziva taking Kate's empty desk made it all so much…final. Stupid, stupid, stupid Tony!' He thought while rubbing his eyes with his hands. 'Now I'm thinking like this! Now! Two months after her death, two months after her funeral. Her funeral for crying out loud! What else does it take to make her death final to me?'

He had to admit it though; after Kate's death he was carrying a burden in the depth of his stomach. In the beginning he thought that feeling this way was normal. He had after all lost a two year colleague with whom he was very close with. So for almost two months he kept going on as usual. He kept going to work almost as if nothing had happened and had actually managed to persuade himself that what he felt was normal; that all those sleepless nights, all those nightmares–when he actually did manage to get a four hours (tops) night sleep- of her dying over and over right in front of him, all that pain he felt every time he looked up from his desk only to find Kate's empty was normal. It had to be, right? Right? Then all of the sudden it hit him. He couldn't believe how oblivious of his own feelings he had been. Two years of his life spent in denial. Two years that could have been the best of his life if only he hadn't been such a jerk.

'I miss you Katy. I miss our endless bickering. I miss your laughter even if most of the time it was on my expense. And I miss how you made me feel; happy and ready to take on the whole world if I had to… or if you told me to. I just had to be stupid enough to not understand what I was feeling until it was to late… Now all the happiness you made me feel is replaced by a black abyss. An endless pit of darkness in which I am drowning' He suddenly stopped what he was thinking and started laughing with all his strength.

'Great DiNozzo. Just great. Now I am a damn poet on top of it all.' He stood up from the couch and headed towards his kitchen, having already given up the idea of some decent night sleep. He instead decided to make some coffee so that he could avoid drinking any type of alcoholics he might have had in his house.

'I already have trouble coping with everyday work routine, I most definitely don't need a hangover' he thought. 'Plus, if Gibbs finds out –and he will no doubt find out- I will be in for a good head slapping'. As he was thinking about all these he passed right in front of his brand new set of weights. He always liked to exercise but after Kate's death he found out that exercising was the way for him to let out some steam.

And it had started to show too… well if you would catch him with his shirt off. Lately, although he still seemed to be flirting with every pretty girl he could get his hands on, he hadn't done anything serious with none of them… and it's not like he didn't have offers. He just wasn't interested.

'And yes, it's true I, Tony DiNozzo, turned a willing girl down' He thought while finishing making his coffee. 'What have you done to me Katy?'

He started moving slowly towards the window he was staring at a few minutes ago only making one stop to turn off his laptop. He had done something he never used to do before this nightmare; he actually took business to his home. He was at this moment looking at some crime photos of a marine officer who died from blood loss caused by what appeared to be a huge hole where his heart and stomach used to be. 'You know lieutenant Jones' Tony thought after taking a look at the photos and the name of the victim 'I can in a way relate with the feeling of emptiness this wound caused you, in a much more metaphorical way off course but which I am afraid that causes me more pain than what you experienced when that wound was inflicted'

With a sigh he closed the file that contained the case photos. He thought that he already had the case breaker; if his speculations were correct –and he was sure they were- he had motive and a suspect to go with it plus a good lead for the murder weapon. He turned off the computer and went for the window. The rain was still pouring outside and it only seemed to get heavier and heavier with every minute.

'Kate, forgive me for being a complete idiot and wasting all the time we had together. I just thought that we would have more of it. I never imagined that you would be taken away from me so violently, which I know was stupid considering our line of work. But Kate you were so vibrant, so full of life and I had the stupid idea that you would be with me forever.' He took another look outside his window and started organizing some thoughts that he was having for sometime now. Despite common belief he was quite a smart guy, how else would he make it to NCIS if he wasn't? He actually had an IQ of 152, spoke five foreign languages fluently (French, Spanish, Italian, Chinese and Russian), had just started studying German and knew his way around computer programs –although not as good as Probie.

He decided at that moment something he was planning for quite a while. He was going to make Kate proud of him. He was going to be responsible and make top NCIS agent. Deep down he still had the hope, childish as it was, that one day magically Kate would come back to him. And he would be ready if that ever happened.

First of all he would drop the joyful act, he just didn't feel that way with Kate gone. Then he would surprise everyone by solving case after case, because he knew he could and he knew he would.

He took another look outside the window to the raging storm and wiped the sole tear that had run from his eyes. ''I will make you proud of me Kate'' he whispered. "I will make it because I loved you, I still love you and I always will''


	3. Changes and Explanations

Hi, it's me again! I hope that you enjoyed reading the first chapter of the story as much as I enjoyed writing it. Many thanks to my amazing reviewers; Amelia-747, xXxLeahxXx, Dropkick95, 7 and angeleyes46. Thank you soooooo much guys! Please keep reviewing! This is my first fic ever and I need your help! By the way this chapter turned out to be really long… Just note that the case that follows will be the longest of this fic, because it is the first one in which Tony gets to prove himself. I am however already planning a TATE scene, but it will be a flashback… it will take some time to get Kate back I'm afraid. Well anyways, enjoy!

**DISCLAIMER;** I, sadly, don't own any of the NCIS characters mentioned in this fic.

**CHANGES AND ****EXPLANATIONS **

Tony's apartment; 5 in the morning

Tony woke up at five in the morning, after one and a half hours of sleep and exactly one hour before his alarm clock was set to wake him up. He got up from his bed and headed for his daily exercise. Firstly, he put on some black sweatpants and a grey t-shirt he had left on the couch a couple of hours ago, tied his shoes and headed out for his half an hour run around the block and through the park near his apartment.

'I really do have to take more care of my apartment. I moved in four months ago and I haven't even unpacked yet' Tony thought. Truth be told, he had left his old apartment when he managed to make some money of his own. Well, a great amount of money to be exact. His father might have disowned him once he decided to become an agent but he happened to have some money his grandmother had left him after her death.

'Come to think of it, _nona_ was the only one who actually was happy I did not follow my fathers' footsteps in business. The only one who realized that business would drive me crazy and surprisingly also the only one who recognized the potential I had in economics. Sure I hate economics and it would slowly kill me if I was seriously involved with it, but making some extra money never hurts I guess…' he thought while he was approaching the park. He liked running so early in the morning, since there was almost no traffic and the park was as quiet -as a park in the middle of a crowded city could be. Also, in this case, everything seemed so clean after last nights' rainfall.

'It only took a small period of studying the stoke market on my days off, a couple of daring decisions and the money my grandma gave me to stop worrying about my pay checks (or the stoke market for that matter) for the rest of my life' he chuckled to himself as he remembered his fathers' stunned voice on the phone after his mother told him the news about Tony's new "hobby". So he had moved to a two stories apartment in the third and fourth floor of a renovated building, with a living room (that had an amazing stone and glass fireplace in it), a fully equipped kitchen (that he had no idea how to use) and a huge library that had room for the new computer he had bought (that actually used three screens) so he could work from home too. At the second floor there was a master bedroom with a king sized bed and a bathroom with a shower and an enormous bathtub, an extra bedroom and an extra bathroom.

'I used to brag about my apartment to Kate, even though I never told her I bought it with my own money and not my dads' …' with that thought he stopped to his track just outside his apartments' building door.

'Damn! No matter what I do every trail of thought leads me back to her… That's why I have to keep going though. I promised I would make her proud and I will. So I better start right now'. And with that he entered the building and took the elevator to his apartment.

He walked inside at exactly five thirty and headed for his daily weightlifting for about fifteen minutes as usual. Then, he put some coffee in the coffeemaker and headed upstairs for a quick shower. As he finished taking his shower he approached his bathroom mirror and started to shave while taking a closer look at his reflection; his muscles had really toned -and he vowed to keep them this way without exaggerating however- while his hair were a bit longer. He had come to the realization however that he liked them at this length so he just spiked them up in order to give them a messy look that kind of worked for him.

The most distinctive change however was his eyes. Once filled with joy, they were now bright and defying, showing the sadness that he kept inside. 'Eyes are the window of the soul they say and I guess they are right' thought Tony.'

After he finished shaving, he exited the bathroom with a towel around his waist and headed for his closet. He picked a pair of dark jeans and a black long sleeved shirt that did nothing but flutter his now exercised body. 'I hope Gibbs has no problem with me wearing jeans. Not that he would notice anyways… I bet he wouldn't even notice if I entered the office with my hair coloured red. Well not until someone mentioned the obvious to him. Honestly, how can a guy that notices the smallest clues in a crime scene be unaware of the changes in people around him?'

He also took his favorite black leather jacket from the closet, picked a set of comfortable black shoes ('because when working with NCIS you don't know when you will have to run for your life') and descended the stairs to the kitchen, put his coffee in a paper cup grabbed his laptop (which he decided to always carry with him), his gun, his badge, his cell and his car keys, exited his apartment and took the elevator to the buildings' garage.

'That was fast, it's only six thirty and the office is only fifteen minutes away. I should be there by six forty five. That means I'll make it to the office about an hour earlier than Gibbs and forty five minutes earlier than Probie and Ziva. Not bad at all DiNozzo. Not bad at all.'

NCIS building; six fifty in the morning;

'So I made it here first. Perfect. Now on to the case. Although I believe I know who did it and why, I still need to verify the murder weapon to back my case up. If my assumptions are correct all I need is access the U.S. military database and search for possible weapons that might have been used…'

With that he turned on his computer and started searching around -with a program he had created so that he wouldn't be discovered- until, fifteen minutes later he found what he needed. Still it was too early for any of the others to show up, so he decided to organize all the parts of the case that he had in his head and put them on his computer since it would help him deal with the paper work he would have after the case was closed. He finished twenty minutes later which still left him about five or ten minutes before everybody else starting showing up.

'I actually have some spare time at work because I finished what I had to do and not because I just fooled around and pretended to work.' he thought. Then he lifted his eyes from his computer and stared at Kate's, or probably he should say Ziva's still empty desk.

'Oh Kate, if only you were to walk here today and sit at that desk. If only I could see you once more and you would tell me that it was all a bad joke and that you would never leave me again. One smile Kate, just one of those amazing little smiles of yours and I would tell Gibbs I don't care about his stupid rule number twelve, or any of the rules he might have for that matter.'

But he was pulled out of his daydreaming violently as he heard Probies' and Zivas' voices from the end of the corridor as they exited the elevator;

"No Ziva, as Tony told you yesterday it is 'needle in a haystack' not hay in a needlestack" McGee said. "Plus I am not even sure if there is a word such as 'needlestack' in English."

"And as I said yesterday it is still the same analogy. It does not change the fact that this case is just incredible" Ziva answered.

Since they were already close enough to his desk Tony thought it was good to let them know he was there (they hadn't noticed him yet) so he answered in a rather cold voice;

"Gee, Ziva I hope you meant to say 'impossible' not 'incredible'. Except off course if you think it great for a guy to die by blood loss caused by a huge hole in his chest…" .He knew that what he said –and especially the way he said it- did sound a bit harsh but he still was a bit angry for what Ziva had said to Gibbs yesterday about Kate's desk;

"_Come on Gibbs. I am sure Kate wouldn't mind if I took her desk"._ Maybe she was right. Maybe Kate wouldn't care. But nothing changed the fact that he did.

"Good morning Tony, I didn't see you there." McGee said, taking a closer look at Tony. "You are here earlier than usual" he added.

"Well good morning to you too Probie" Tony said and feeling a sudden urge to tease McGee he added "I didn't know you noticed when I come to office in the morning. You aren't by any chance stalking me now, are you?"

McGee just blushed as usual and muttered a quick "No" for an answer, while taking his seat behind his desk.

Ziva also looked at Tony in a way he was surprised to recognize as a flirtatious look women gave him from times to times. 'O.K. that was weird. I guess it is true what they say that women are more attracted to men that act indifferent towards them'.

"Hi DiNozzo, you are right, I did mean impossible, but you get what I said. There is no solving this case. No witnesses, no fingerprints, no DNA, no nothing." She said.

Tony didn't answer because he at the moment felt a stabbing in his heart, watching Ziva sitting in Kate's desk.

Thankfully, he didn't have a lot of time to think about that fact since a very pissed off Gibbs entered the office seconds later.

"I just hung up the phone to a very much enraged base commander, who wants answers about what happened to his base. So I want results now!" Gibbs ordered while pacing back and forth in front of his team.

"But Gibbs, it's too soon yet. There are no leads for the case." Ziva said.

As Tony was ready to speak McGee added; "Boss I've been working on a motive but I do not have the evidence to back it up yet"

"Gibbs…" Tony started to talk, but was once again interrupted, only by Gibbs this time.

"Well, are you expecting a special invitation McGee? Speak!" He ordered while drinking his first coffee for that day.

"It has to do with the victim's wife-to-be" McGee started…

'That was my first hypothesis too Probie,' Tony thought 'but you are far from the truth'. However Gibbs thought McGee's idea was good and he started once again giving orders;

"David, you and DiNozzo will…" he started, but Tony -who was already getting pissed from being ignored- raising his voice in the same cold tone he had used before with Ziva said;

"DiNozzo has something to say about the case if you would listen to him for a few seconds" the result was instant. Everybody stopped what they were doing and looked at him. Ziva and Probie had a surprised look plastered on their faces, while Gibbs had a look half interested and half consisting of his famous 'I am about to slap your head' look.

"Good. Now that I finally have your attention I would like to inform you that I might have solved the case. Care to listen what I have to say or not?" The silence was complete, until Gibbs regained his composure.

"DiNozzo, I hope, for your own shake, that what you have to say is important and you are not just wasting my time"

"Trust me boss, you want to hear this." Tony said and headed for the screen that usually McGee used to show what he had come with to the rest of the team. He uploaded the crime photos he had taken the day before and started explaining;

"I should probably start talking about the murder weapon before anything else" Tony started, only to be interrupted by Ziva.

"But there was no gun powder on the body and Abby said that it would be difficult if not impossible to identify the weapon before we catch the actual killer" she said. McGee was about to agree and Gibbs was about to interrupt once again so Tony said calmly but still in the same cold tone;

"And it will continue being impossible unless you let me finish what I am trying to say. Got it?" Everybody was looking at him again without speaking, although Tony almost broke into laughs once he saw Probies' face; he now looked clearly awestricken.

"So, as I was saying before, I should probably start with the murder weapon. As you can see the inflicted wound is huge and, as Ziva just informed you, Abby said that there was no gun powder on the wound. There were however some burns that suggested the wound was cauterized just after it was inflicted." He then showed them another photo he had taken from the field behind the crime scene, which he had now displayed on the screen; "Remember this pit we found at the field behind the crime scene?" After he said that everybody -even Gibbs- nodded yes, so he continued;

"We all thought the murderer or murderers wanted to hide the body so they started digging a hole, only to stop when they realized they didn't have time enough, so they just ditched the victim where he was and left the crime scene. We even found some boot prints inside the pit" while saying that he zoomed in so they could see an enlarged boot print on the screen "that Abby identified to be produced by a standard military boot size twelve. I didn't like the explanation we had given though, so I started thinking; what if these two facts -the pit and the burns- were related?"

He then entered the military weapon database and as soon as it was displayed on the screen he continued explaining; "The fact that it was military boot prints we found inside the pit led me to believe that the murderer was either in the army himself or that he had close relation with the military base lieutenant Jones was stationed in. Then I remembered that a few days ago that same base had announced the purchase of a new type of guided missiles from abroad. Those missiles were supposed to be delivered the day of the murder by the way. So, I searched the military weapon database and…" he didn't manage to finish his sentence though as McGee exclaimed;

"But you need clearance to access that database. You need three separate codes just to enter the main weapon list and for further details you need…"

"O.K. Probie." Tony said. "If it will make you feel better I should say that in shake of not wasting any time getting the clearance, I hacked into the database and…"

"You hacked into the database? But this would take hours and you would need a powerful system so that you wouldn't be traced and then…" McGee kept going on looking beyond shocked. At the same time Ziva had gapped and looked at Tony like it was the first time she actually noticed him, while Gibbs had a mixed look of disbelief and… could that be pride?

Tony just rolled his eyes and cut McGee saying; "No need to worry Probie. I am not going to be assassinated by marine seals anytime soon. They will never realize I hacked into their database and even if they did, they will be led to believe that whoever did it was located somewhere in central Africa." McGee stopped talking but he still had the same look in his face.

Tony turned to Gibbs and asked; "Boss, should I continue?"

Gibbs, who was now serious but looked really pleased with Tony nodded yes, so Tony kept going on; "I hacked into the database and found out that the missiles were bought from Russia and they were called H4K-71. The database said that 400 of these missiles were delivered, but their characteristics were not uploaded yet. So I hacked into the Russian military database for further information." Saying that he turned to McGee who was ready to speak once again and said; "Yeah, Probie the Russian database. But don't worry as I said before even if they find out what I did, the trace will lead them to the middle of the Sahara desert."

Ignoring McGee's shocked face he continued explaining entering the Russian database at the same time; "As you can see here" he said pointing out the 3-D image of a missile "this is the missile in question. He then showed them the page with the missiles characteristics which was off course in Russian. "Since I am the only one who can speak Russian in the room, let me translate what it writes here."

"You can speak Russian?" Ziva asked in a tone that expressed her disbelief.

"Let's assume that I am not just wasting your time here for a second and before you ask again, yes, I do speak Russian. Now, it says here that this missile is hydrogen powered, launched and guided by computers and does not explode on impact unless the right command is sent by the controller. It is also practically soundless unless it explodes and as you can see its length is eleven inches while it is four inches wide. Also it can be reused if it does not explode and does not sustain serious damage on the impact. "

"So you are saying that the victim was killed with one of those missiles?" Gibbs wanted to know.

"No, boss I don't think, I am sure. The wound is the right size, the burn marks are consistent with the ones made by hydrogen in high temperature, plus…" Tony said while displaying another page of the Russian database on the screen "it says here that the Russian government sold 405 of these missiles to the U.S. army. If you remember the American database says that 400 were delivered."

"So we are missing five of those missiles. We should find out who had access to them and…" Gibbs started, but was interrupted by Tony who said;

"Already done boss. It seems that except lieutenant Jones who actually had access to those missiles, a lieutenant Travis Rosenberg also had access." Saying that he displayed Rosenberg's file on the screen. "Rosenberg is forty three years old 6.5" feet tall and wears boots size twelve. He was responsible for storing the missiles and updating the database. By the way I should mention that if no one suspected some of the missiles were missing, nobody would find out they were gone, since nobody has access to both Russian and American databases and because, frankly, who would bother checking?" Saying that he turned to face the three stunned agents behind him.

"I checked on him and he is nowhere to be found. That's why I decided to check his personal computer." He pointed once again to the screen, where Rosenberg's e-mails were now displayed; "He tried to erase his e-mails, but he wasn't very successful. I managed to 'salvage' them and that's what I found; he has been communicating with this server, which I was unable to trace, about a 'package' he was suppose to deliver to the unknown server. He actually mentioned that the 'package' arrived the day of the murder and that the 'problem' was taken care off."

"By 'problem' he obviously refers to Jones, right?" Ziva asked.

"That is the most probable explanation. With Jones out of the way, the only other person in the base that had access to the missiles, nobody would notice the missing ones." Tony said. "What is more interesting though was the last e-mail I found." He said pointing to another one of the e-mails. "Rosenberg mentioned a meeting for delivering the 'package', today at 17:00 hours, at the international airport. Five of the H4K-71 missiles can easily fit inside a big suitcase or two smaller ones. Oh, and in case you wonder, each of these missiles costs 25.000 American dollars."

Tony for the first time since he started explaining took a good look at the other three agents and waited for their reactions.


	4. Reactions and Actions

Hi, everybody! I went as fast as I could and look! A new chapter! Thanks again to my reviewers. Those reviews mean the world to me. Please keep reviewing… Anyways, I had the weirdest ideas for this fic… Something that has to do with red ribbons, Tony in a tuxedo… You'll have to wait and see I guess. Now on with the story.

**DISCLAIMER;** I, sadly, don't own any of the NCIS characters mentioned in this fic.

**REACTIONS AND ACTIONS**

NCIS office building; 8 thirty in the morning;

After his explanations Tony was waiting for a reaction from the three agents. Any reaction. But it just didn't come. 'Are they too shocked to talk? What did they think? That I am a complete idiot?' Tony thought. He waited for some more seconds until he started feeling uncomfortable under their gaze, so he turned to Gibbs and asked;

"So boss, what do you want us to do?"

It seemed that that was what they needed to wake from their trance, since they all started talking together.

"When and how did you do all this work?" McGee wanted to know.

"What time did you said the meeting in the airport is?" asked Gibbs.

"Since when do you speak Russian" Ziva pondered?

'O.K., now they are giving me a headache' thought Tony and immediately decided to answer only Gibbs's question, since it was the only one that was actually related to the case.

"At five this afternoon boss. The e-mail said; package delivery, 11th of November, 17:00 hours, international airport, Mike's." Tony said turning to Gibbs.

"Mike's?" Asked Gibbs.

"Yeah, that's why I know that they are meeting to the airport that is near Rosenberg's base. Turns out 'Mike's' is a bar in the airport and the unofficial meeting point of the base's officers when they travel from that airport. I think it's because it is owned by a former marine seal or something like that…" Tony said.

"Right then. McGee, you try to locate that unknown server DiNozzo mentioned. David, call the airport and tell them we will send agents to check on the cameras. If they ask why, tell them we are searching for an escapee from the state prison. There is no need to tell them that five dangerous weapons are about to enter their airport and cause panic." Gibbs said. He then turned to Tony and said; "DiNozzo, you call special operations and tell them we need them to discretely surround the airport and make sure that they get the 'discretely' part right"

"Consider it done, boss" Tony answered.

"I am going to inform the director about this and I'll be back in a few minutes" concluded Gibbs and turned to leave. He suddenly stopped though and looked at Tony who was already dialing the special operations number.

"And DiNozzo" he said.

"Yeah, boss?" asked Tony.

"Good job." Gibbs said and proceeded to the director's office.

Tony raised an eyebrow and stared at Gibbs for a couple of seconds smirking, as he realized that 'good job' was the best compliment he could ever receive from Gibbs for doing his job. He went back to his phone call, missing the looks of amazement that came from McGee and Ziva, who had also heard Gibbs compliment.

NCIS office building; Director Shepard's office; 9 in the morning;

"So you are trying to convince me that the killer of lieutenant Jones is actually going to sell mass destruction weapons he stole from the army in an international airport. Today. And that you got this information by agent DiNozzo who hacked into the Russian and American military databases. Without clearance." A very much confused director Jennifer Shepard asked a very much pissed off agent Gibbs. For the second time.

"Rule number 23, Jen." Gibbs said.

"Excuse me?" Jennifer asked, even more confused this time.

"DiNozzo didn't ask for clearance because he followed rule number 23; better ask for forgiveness than for permission." Gibbs explained. "And I am not trying to convince you about anything. I'm just giving you the facts and informing you about my next actions, as you requested Jen." He added.

Jennifer sighed and tried to take in all the information she had just received. "Jethro, I am only going to ask you once; are you absolutely certain that what you just told me is true? I do not want to base a complete operation on a hunch DiNozzo had and jeopardize my position over nothing." She said approaching Gibbs.

Gibbs looked at her with disbelief. "It is not a hunch. I saw the databases and lieutenant Rosenberg's e-mails myself." He said. "Anyways I wouldn't do anything to jeopardize your position" he added bitterly, while thinking 'Your precious position, which seems to be all you care about these days'.

Jennifer, who was too concerned thinking about how she would justify the operation to her superiors without mentioning the illegal hacking into military databases to notice the bitterness in his voice, said; "O.K. Jethro. I'm going to go with you on this one. Just make sure you are not going to lose the suspect and I will take care of everything else."

"Thank you director. Now if you don't need me for anything else I should return to my agents and organize the operation." Gibbs said, stressing the word 'director'.

Jennifer, who was still trying to come up with a convincing reason to give to her superiors as to why she had just approved of such an operation, just said; "Yes, off course. You should better go."

Gibbs just sighed and left Jennifer's office thinking that no matter what he did, he was never going to completely understand that woman.

NCIS office building; 12 thirty in the evening;

For the past three and a half hours Tony had non stop tried to organize the operation to the airport. He was going to make sure everything went perfect in this operation. It was the first one to be actually based completely on him and he wanted it to work. So he would make it work. For himself but most importantly, for Kate. 'I only wish you were here to see this Katie, you would be so proud of me. If you haven't thought of the solution first that is.'

Lost in his thoughts he didn't notice some of his colleagues staring at him from the other side of the room. But they were there none the less. As a matter of fact, that specific moment Abby Sciutto, Timothy McGee and Ziva David were observing every move Tony made and talking about those observations with each other;

"So he actually hacked those databases, solve the case that nobody could solve by himself and now he is organizing an operation to capture a killer and some weapon smugglers" Abby said, trying to summarize all she had heard during the last fifteen minutes. "Who is this guy and what has he done to Tony?"

"I know." McGee said. "If I hadn't seen it with my own eyes or if he hadn't actually made fun of me three times in the past two hours, I would be skeptical too."

"I don't know why, but I think that he looks hotter than ever" Ziva said.

The answer to that statement was two amazed looks from Abby and McGee and spontaneous "What are you talking about?" from both of them.

"No, I am serious" Ziva insisted. "Look Abby you are a woman, right?"

"Should I be insulted right now Ziva?" Abby asked.

"Why?" Ziva wanted to know.

"I think you just questioned if she is a female or not." McGee stated.

"What he said" Abby agreed.

"That is not what I meant. I just stated the obvious." Ziva said.

"Oh, if you put it that way…" Abby started, but never got to finish her sentence since Ziva interrupted her.

"As I was saying, you are a woman and you can't disagree when I say that Tony is not what you would call bad looking." Ziva continued.

"I will have to agree with that." Abby said, while McGee looked at her in shock.

"His problem sometimes however is that he can't be trusted to be serious in serious situations. But look at him now. He is giving orders and solving cases and being complemented by Gibbs, all in four hours." Ziva said.

"Talk about complete transformation!" Abby stated.

"And I think that Ziva is not the only one that has that opinion" McGee informed them.

"Come on Tim," Abby said, feeling her heart skip a beat as she saw all her hopes about McGee disappearing "don't tell me that you…"

"Me? What about me?" McGee asked confused. Then he started blushing furiously as he understood what Abby had suggested. "No! No, Abby, I am not talking about me!"

"Oh!" Abby said letting out a breath she didn't even know she was holding.

"Then whom are you talking about?" Ziva asked.

"Well I don't know if it's just me," McGee continued "but doesn't it seem like agent Blake is trying to get his attention?"

"What do you mean she is trying to get his attention? How?" Abby asked.

"Well," McGee said "the building has temperature control that keeps the temperature cool enough. However she has unbuttoned the top two buttons of her shirt and she keeps walking in front of Tony's desk with no obvious reason. She has already done it six, no scratch that, seven times the past hour." He said as agent Blake passed in front of Tony's desk once more.

"And the unbelievable here is not agent Blake trying to get Tony's attention but the fact he is ignoring her!" Abby exclaimed.

And it was true. Tony was completely oblivious about agent Blake and her attempts to flirt with him, due to being completely absorbed with his work.

However, they didn't have the time to further analyze Tony's behavior, as Gibbs chose that exact moment to announce; "Final update everybody. We are leaving in thirty minutes."


	5. Operation Airport

Hi everybody! I am so sorry for the long wait but I was out of the country for five days… Anyways I'm back now and I'm glad to announce that the next chapter is ready! I think that it is the longest yet by the way… Thanks once again to my amazing reviewers! I am so happy people actually take the time to review my story! Now, with no more delay; on with the story!

**DISCLAIMER;** I, sadly, don't own any of the NCIS characters mentioned in this fic.

**OPERATION AIRPORT**

NCIS office building; 12 forty five in the evening;

Once everybody had gathered, Gibbs began the final update before going to the airport; "Let's go through this once again. Suspects' name is Travis Rosenberg. He is a lieutenant in the same base as the victim, lieutenant Jones. He is 6.5" feet tall and has brown hair and green eyes. He will be probably carrying either one large suitcase or two smaller ones…" said Gibbs.

"Boss, if I may…" Tony asked for Gibbs' permission.

"Speak then." Gibbs said wondering what Tony had come up with.

"I would just like to add that he had planned this for a long time so it is possible he is disguised. However, I came up with something that might be useful; when he was twenty seven he participated in an army operation in the Middle East. He was injured by a grenade, but he has no facial scars. His left eardrum however was damaged severely from the blast leaving him with an earpiece in his left ear and an office job. He was also injured at his left leg and took therapy for eighteen months in order to walk normal again. Although he succeeded the H4K-71 missiles are not light and he will be carrying five of them. So there is a strong possibility that he will be limping from his left leg. He also used to take pills for a psychic disorder he had, but his file says that he has stopped the treatment for two years now." Tony announced.

"And how did you find out all these?" Abby, who had stayed to listen to the update, asked.

Tony, who always thought of Abby as the little sister he never had, gave her a huge grin and a mischievous look and answered; "Oh, let's just say I 'borrowed' the information from the army's health department…"

"Aren't those information confidential?" Gibbs asked in mock anger.

"They are?" Tony answered with an equally mock expression of surprise.

'I can't believe what I'm seeing' Abby thought. 'Gibbs and Tony are joking with each other. The world must be coming to an end.' She then turned to McGee and they shared a look of disbelief as Tony continued;

"Off course I don't mean that you should arrest the first man with a limp or an earpiece. However if you see a guy around 6.5" tall, with two suitcases, an earpiece and a limp approaching Mike's… you get the rest" Tony said in a matter-of-fact tone.

"And by no means should you move before you are ordered to." Gibbs continued. "We are interested in arresting the buyers too, so we are going to wait for the right moment. Am I clear?" he asked in a serious tone.

Everybody in the room nodded yes. They knew that the specific tone in Gibbs voice meant that anyone who disobeyed would have to quit his job and leave for a long vacation in Antarctica, to escape Gibbs' rage.

"O.K. then. Remember to only communicate from a safe frequency, always inform other agents before you proceed to an arrest and stick to the plan; after the trade is made, the team led by Ziva and McGee will follow the buyers, wait until they leave Rosenberg's eyesight and then arrest them, while the team led by me and DiNozzo will wait for the first team's signal. We follow the suspect and arrest him only after I say so. Got it?" Gibbs asked.

Once again everybody, even Abby, nodded yes.

Finally Gibbs said; "Even after he has traded the weapons it is highly possible that Rosenberg will be armed. As DiNozzo just informed us, it is also possible that he suffers from some psychic disorder, since he stopped his medical treatment. In plain English that means there is a good chance he is unstable. He deliberately chose a crowded place such as an international airport so that we wouldn't be able to move freely. Remember he has already committed one murder and he won't hesitate to commit some more. Now move it people. We have a flight to catch."

International airport; four thirty in the afternoon;

Tony was standing still, pretending to be severely interested in his newspaper. He was, for the past two hours, situated in a café across Mike's bar in the international airport waiting for a signal that somebody had identified Rosenberg. He was ready to ask Gibbs, who was at the moment pretending to be solving a crossword in the other side of the café, if they had any news, when all of the sudden;

"Could I get you anything else sir?" The third waitress in the past fifteen minutes asked.

She was about six feet tall, with blond hair and blue eyes. Definitely Tony's type. Until he met Kate. He sighed thinking that he would always compare any woman he met with Kate. And he knew no other woman would ever measure up. He did however managed a polite manner and just said; "No, thank you."

"Ah, O.K. I guess. Well if you change your mind, just call Rebecca, handsome" She said blinking and pointing at her name tag that wrote 'Rebecca'.

"Sure thing" Tony said with a sad smile.

Once Rebecca left, he heard Gibbs murmuring through his earpiece; "DiNozzo, since the waitresses seem to be too busy flirting with you to serve drinks, could you inform the next one that comes to your table that I would like some more coffee? I've been trying to get their attention for the past twenty minutes."

Tony tried to suppress a laugh, thinking it might be weird for a guy to laugh by himself while supposedly reading an article about poverty in the third world, and just muttered a; "Sure, boss."

Then however he heard Ziva's voice; "Possible suspect located at ten o'clock. Brown military haircut, right height, two suitcases, black jacket, heading for Mike's"

On her sign, Tony and Gibbs turned their heads as discretely as they could towards the direction Ziva had pointed out. Tony was the one to spot him first; 'His features look a lot like Rosenberg's.' He thought. He then whispered to the rest of the agents; "Possible suspect approaching Mike's. Same facial features as Rosenberg's. Appears to be limping slightly but I have no sight of his left side."

At that moment he heard McGee's voice saying "I do". McGee was stationed at a bench near Mike's and pretended to read a healthy diet magazine. The suspect should pass right in front of him in order to approach Mike's.

"He is coming closer" McGee whispered as the suspect approached him. "Boss, he is wearing an earpiece and he is and he is definitely limping." He exclaimed as the suspect passed right in front of him.

"O.K. everybody," Gibbs said while watching the suspect taking a seat at Mike's "We have possible identification. Wait for my signal. We still have five minutes until five."

Tony felt his heart beating faster. He knew that they had planned this operation as carefully as possible. He himself had done all he could to make everything go as they were supposed to. But ever since he saw the suspect he knew two things; 'Firstly,' he thought 'I know in my gut that this is Rosenberg'. Tony always had faith in what he called his 'gut' since he was a detective in homicides and it had never proved him wrong. 'Secondly, I have this bad feeling that something is going to go wrong. There is no way a guy like Rosenberg doesn't have a back-up plan. Plus he has the element of surprise on his side, since we have no idea as to what he had been doing for two days after Jones' murder.'

But before he could share his thoughts with the rest of the agents he heard Gibbs announcing; "We have movement. Everybody hold your positions."

Tony took a look at Mike's and understood what Gibbs was talking about. Two guys that had been sitting at Mike's for the past thirty minutes left their table holding one black suitcase each, identical with the ones Rosenberg was holding, and headed towards the lieutenant.

"O.K. everybody" Gibbs said "Wait until the trade and then follow the plan"

Tony's heart was racing manically but he managed to remain as calm as possible, while watching the trade taking place. He saw the suitcases changing hands, he saw the buyers heading out while Rosenberg stood still as if nothing had happened, and he saw McGee, Ziva and their team following the buyers. He even heard Gibbs saying; "Wait for my mark" before hell broke loose.

Because no sooner than Gibbs had talked, a gunshot was heard from one of the buyers. Tony didn't have time to ask what happened as chaos broke out around him. People starting screaming and taking cover, while the agents that hadn't followed the buyers reached for their guns. He heard Gibbs screaming for everyone to stay calm but he knew it was already too late. And what was worst was the fact that he was right. Rosenberg had a back up plan.

He got up from his table, pulled a gun he had hidden under his jacket and shot once in the air. A scream was heard at the same time from all the people at the two cafés and then there was silence. That was the moment that Rosenberg decided to speak for the first time, while raising his left hand up so that every one could see it;

"Guess things don't always go as planed" Rosenberg shouted.

At the same moment Tony felt a chill running down his spine. 'Rosenberg's voice sounds completely insane' he thought.

"I suppose that among these people are some agents that were sent to capture me" Rosenberg continued. "Well before thinking about shooting at me," he said clearly amused "you should probably know that right now in my left hand I am holding and already pressing the button of a detonator. If you shoot me I will let go of the button causing this lovely bar here to explode, and with it all the people in a twenty five square feet radius from the bomb. Are you ready to kill those people agents? Because I sure am."

Tony heard Gibbs saying with a grave voice; "Nobody move. He is unstable and ready to carry on with his threats." But he didn't care. He was too absorbed observing Rosenberg's detonator.

'It's a home made devise' he thought. 'In order to actually cause the bomb to explode, Rosenberg has to be twelve to fourteen feet tops away from the devise.' He then observed his surroundings. 'Even if we manage to pull him in the other side of the corridor, he will still be close enough to set of an explosion' Tony thought.

Then he saw were Rosenberg was standing and started thinking of the craziest plan of his life. He made sure that he was covered behind his desk and, while Rosenberg was mumbling about how politics had corrupted the army, he reached for his cell. He then dialed Abby's number. 'Come on Abby pick it up' he wished. 'Please for once don't listen to loud music and listen to your cell phone'.

"Hi Tony" Abby's cheery voice was heard from the other side of the line. "Is the operation…" Abby started to say but Tony interrupted her.

"Abby please listen, we don't have time. Can you locate my cell's signal?"

"O.K. give me a second" Abby said in a more serious voice. "Done! You are in the second floor of the international airport."

"Great, Abby. Now call the special operations agents outside the airport and give them my exact position. Tell them to put a full luggage carrier outside right across my current location." Tony ordered.

"But why…" Abby started to ask, while Tony just said;

"Please Abby. The lives of many people, including mine, depend upon you doing exactly as I said. And remember right across my current location." Tony insisted.

"O.K. Tony, give me a couple of minutes" Abby said.

While Abby was doing what he had told her, Tony looked once again at Rosenberg, who was now almost in shock. 'We don't have much time left' he thought. 'He is about to snap any minute now.'

He then heard Abby's voice from his cell; "Everything is ready, but what are you planning to do?" She asked with a worried tone in her voice.

"Not even I am sure Abby" Tony answered truthfully and hung up.

He then used his earpiece to talk to Gibbs; "Boss, I have an idea but I need you to trust me" Tony said.

"What kind of idea?" Gibbs asked, with concern in his voice.

"We don't have time for explanations now boss. As I said, you will just have to trust me on this one. Just tell every one to hold their fire." Tony said.

For a couple of seconds Gibbs gave no response. Then however he ordered; "You heard DiNozzo. Hold your fire until further instructions. DiNozzo just try not to get killed." He said, expressing his concern as well as he could.

"I'll do my best boss." Tony said with a sad smile, thinking; 'No turning back now I guess'.

With that thought in his mind, he yelled; "Rosenberg, listen to me."

Rosenberg seemed surprised that someone called his name, so he turned to the direction Tony's voice had come from.

"What do you want? I thought the government officials don't negotiate with terrorists!" Rosenberg screamed.

"But you are not a terrorist." Tony answered. He had decided to feed on his paranoia about the army being corrupted. "You are lieutenant Travis Rosenberg. You were injured in the battlefield. You are a hero not a terrorist." Tony continued.

"Damn right I am!" Rosenberg said proud of himself.

Tony realized it was a good time to keep talking. So he said; "Look, I am going to come out now so we can speak face to face. Do I have your word as a marine that you will not hurt me if I do so?"

"Off course you do. A marine never breaks his promises." Rosenberg said proudly.

'He lost his mind!' Gibbs thought. The same thought passed from everybody's mind as they saw Tony rising from his hide out, his gun pointing the sealing and taking a few steps towards Rosenberg.

Gibbs tried to order Tony to remain in his place, but to no avail. He had already taken his earpiece off.

"I actually admire what you did" Tony told Rosenberg taking a few more steps towards him. "You took action and weakened the corrupted army from inside." He was now only six feet away.

"Yes, I did." Rosenberg stated. "I outsmarted them all"

"You are right, you did." Tony said. With two more steps he was at five feet.

"I am smarter than them and smarter than you! What did you think? That you could come close enough to shoot me?" Rosenberg asked ready to take a few steps back.

"No, my intentions are honest" Tony said calmly. "If you feel uncomfortable with the gun I can throw it away" He continued. He was now at four feet.

"Yeah, you do that" Rosenberg ordered.

'No! No matter what DiNozzo, don't throw your gun away' Gibbs wished with all the strength of his mind.

But it was already too late, as Tony said to Rosenberg; "I am going to throw my gun away now o.k.? Which side do you want me to throw it to?" He asked trying to maintain Rosenberg's belief of superiority.

"Throw it to my side" Rosenberg ordered.

Tony took a step and bent over throwing his gun towards Rosenberg's side. Doing so, he was happy to realize that Rosenberg broke their eye contact and looked at the weapon that was sliding towards him instead. He was only three feet away.

"Do you think I am stupid agent?" Rosenberg asked. "Throw away your back-up weapon too!"

"No worries" said Tony as calmly as he could. "I was just about to do so. But I will have to reach to my right ankle. That is where I keep it."

"Not very original of you agent. Anyway, throw your weapon to me. Just remember that my weapon will be pointing at your head." Rosenberg threatened Tony.

'That's where I'm counting on' Tony thought but said; "I didn't expect anything less from an experienced marine."

'What is Tony doing?' McGee wondered as Tony was taking yet another step towards Rosenberg and reached for his ankle. 'If he does that he will be unarmed against a maniac.'

'Two feet' Tony thought. 'That is as close as it gets'. He took his second gun from the case in his ankle, looked at Rosenberg's eyes and showed it to him as he asked; "I'm going to throw it next to the other one, right?"

"You do that." Said Rosenberg taking his eyes off Tony and looking at the second weapon that Tony slide on the floor.

'No turning back now' Tony thought once again and put the last part of his plan into motion. He jumped at a very surprised Rosenberg and with his one hand turned Rosenberg's weapon to the other side, while at the same time he used his other hand to prevent Rosenberg's left hand from letting the detonator from his grasp. He simultaneously started pushing Rosenberg and himself towards the window.

Rosenberg tried to fight back but his limp leg and the fact that Tony caught him by surprise didn't leave him many chances. So there was nothing he could do when Tony used his own finger to push the trigger and shoot at the window behind them three times. And he had nothing left to do when Tony pushed him towards the same window which smashed into little pieces by their combined weights. So he did all he could do as they started taking a two stories dive to their death. He screamed at the top of his lungs.

Tony didn't scream. He didn't hesitate. The only thought that occupied his mind as he probably sent them both to their deaths was; 'Kate, I hope you are watching this…'


	6. A Close Escape

Hello, everybody! It's me again… First of all; a million thanks to my reviewers! Thank you for giving me a reason to continue writing! What is more I realized that I was a bit behind with my story, so I worked as fast as I could and look; another chapter! I know that you guys want to see Kate coming back as soon as possible, and I am glad to report that she is about to start making some appearances in about five or six chapters from now (I warned you this was going to be a long story!). But I promise there will be some Tate romance in the next chapter. Until then, enjoy this chapter!

Yours faithfully,

xXDesertRoseXx

**Disclaimer;** I, sadly, don't own any of the NCIS characters mentioned in this fic.

**A CLOSE ESCAPE**

International airport; second floor; 5 fifteen in the afternoon.

'I didn't just see that. That never happened.' NCIS agent Timothy McGee tried to convince himself. 'No. Tony didn't just push an insane murderer and himself out of the window to a two stories dive.' He thought trying to believe that the image of Tony falling of the window was just his mind's creation. But he had to face the facts. The broken window was right in front of him. He looked around. Everything was still and the silence was so complete that for a moment he thought he had lost his hearing. He saw Ziva looking at the broken window with fear and surprise written on her face. But what scared him the most was the look on Gibbs' face. It wasn't fear and it wasn't pain. It was just blank. It was the same look he had at Kate's funeral.

He tried to talk but his voice couldn't come out. He tried to move but his legs wouldn't obey. Then everything started moving again. He could see people from Mike's bar trying to understand what had just happened. He heard them screaming and crying and asking if their families or friends were o.k. He then saw many of them, including Gibbs, Ziva and some other agents move towards the broken window. So he did to. He reached the window and looked down expecting to see Tony's broken body. Expecting to see yet again, in less than three months, another one of his colleagues, another one of his friends dead, covered in blood. He didn't however expect to see what he actually saw.

'I am not seeing this. This isn't happening.' He thought once again in less than two minutes.

International airport; somewhere between the second floor and the ground; five fifteen in the afternoon.

Everything was happening in slow motion. Tony felt the window's glass breaking and Rosenberg and himself falling fast. He realized he was still holding Rosenberg beneath him as they fell. Somewhere in between he heard Rosenberg scream. But only when they reached the first floor did he see what he wanted to see. A full luggage carrier right under them.

'Note to self. Thank Abby' he thought, as he prepared himself for the impact. Because he knew that whether the carrier was full or not, suitcases are not pillows.

The impact itself came right afterwards. 'That wasn't that bad' he thought. 'I wouldn't recommend it to Probie though'.

"I am going to kill you!" Rosenberg screamed at Tony's face. During the impact, Tony had let go of his left hand and the detonator now lay useless a few inches away.

He had made sure though that he still held Rosenberg's right hand with the gun in it.

Now however, Rosenberg was trying to set himself free from Tony's grasp so he could shoot him.

'I didn't just fell down from the second floor to get shot by you' Tony thought as he struggled not to let go of Rosenberg's hand. During the struggle they fell down from the carrier and on the cement of the airway. Tony was still holding Rosenberg's right hand with his left, but now Rosenberg was on top. And he was slowly pointing his gun towards Tony's head.

"Any last words agent?" He said grinning manically.

That was the moment that Tony picked to slam his head right into Rosenberg's nose. It was just the distraction he needed to knock Rosenberg's gun away with his left hand and throw a vicious right hook at his face.

"Any last words?" He asked as he reached for his handcuffs which he then put on the hands of a now bleeding Rosenberg.

"How about; never piss a guy who is trying to look good for the woman he loves?" He asked Rosenberg as he pulled him to his feet.

He then looked up at the broken window thinking mischievously; 'Damn, that was a long fall!' and then more seriously; 'Gibbs is going to kill me before I get to explain him what just happened.' That was the exact moment that he saw some people looking down from the window and straight at him. Recognizing Gibbs among them, he couldn't resist yelling at the top of his voice; "Are you coming down or do I have to bring the suspect up myself?"

International airport; second floor; five seventeen in the afternoon.

Agent Jethro Gibbs had just decided to stop trusting his senses. He refused to believe what his eyes and ears where telling him. He knew that DiNozzo was dead. Period. But if that was the case, then who was that guy asking them to come down?

He then heard a gasp coming from right next to him and turned to see a shocked agent McGee and an equally shocked officer David who at the same time was whispering; "He is alive. How can he be alive?" Then he heard a loud applause coming from everyone who had just witnessed the bomb incident.

So he decided to admit, until he could come up with a more reasonable explanation, that Anthony DiNozzo was alive and kicking. He then came to his senses and yelled back at Tony; "Agent DiNozzo, don't you dare move. We are coming to get you."

He then turned to agent McGee and ordered; "Call the paramedics now. DiNozzo might need them after I am done with him."

At the same time -though unknown to Gibbs- one Tony DiNozzo was thinking; 'Yes, it's official. I am in big trouble'. He then let out a sigh, kicked lieutenant Rosenberg (who was trying to escape) at the gut, leaving him unconscious and waited for the inevitable to happen.

International airport; ground floor; five twenty in the afternoon.

'Here they come' thought Tony as he saw Gibbs, McGee, Ziva and some other agents exiting the airport.

They all reached him at the some time but McGee was the one who moved first. He took three steps forward and pulled Tony into a brotherly hug. Tony, although he did realize why McGee was hugging him, couldn't resist teasing him a bit so he just said; "O.k. Probie. Where does that leave us now?"

McGee suddenly moved back blushing once again but said nothing. Tony then took a good look at the others for the first time after his little disappearing act. Gibbs had an unreadable expression, while Ziva looked ready to kiss him. McGee was still blushing but looked relieved. So Tony decided to speak first;

"Before answering your questions, you might want to take Rosenberg away. He is unconscious right now but he won't be for much longer"

Gibbs ordered some of the agents to take Rosenberg to the NCIS building and then turned to Tony.

"Do you have a death wish DiNozzo? Because that is the only thing I can come with after watching you willingly fall from that window. You could have easily died back there. Come to think of it, I don't even know how you survived with not even a scratch." Gibbs said furiously.

"Boss, I, despite how all this looks like, am neither crazy nor suicidal. I just took the only measure I could think about, given the circumstances. I can explain everything." Tony said.

"Really DiNozzo?" Gibbs continued. "You mean you can explain the fact that you decided to jump out of a window hoping that something would just break your fall?"

"No boss, I didn't hope for anything. I knew there would be a luggage carrier here to brake my fall" Tony answered.

"How did you know that?" Gibbs wanted to know.

"Because Abby told me" Tony answered once again.

"What does Abby have to do with all this?" Gibbs asked once again, this time with a hint of curiosity in his voice.

"In order to explain everything, I must tell you what happened from the beginning. Should I start boss?" Tony asked.

"Explain yourself DiNozzo" Said Gibbs.

"Once I realized that Rosenberg was holding a detonator" Tony said "I tried to figure out what type of detonator it was. As you can see," he said showing them the detonator he had taken from the carrier while he was waiting for them "this is a home made device that works with nine Walt batteries. I then knew that in order to trigger an explosion Rosenberg would have to be within fourteen feet tops away from the bomb. I then realized that even if we tried to make him move, the corridor wasn't long enough and even if it was, we would never be so fast to immobilize him before he decided to let go of the detonator's button."

"Yeah, but what does Abby have to do with all these?" McGee asked.

"If you stop interrupting me I will get there Probie." Tony said teasingly. "As I was saying, I realized that the only way to remove Rosenberg fast enough was out the window. But nobody could guarantee that he wouldn't let go of the detonator as he fell, thus triggering a blast. So I realized I would have do go down with him. But since I do not have a death wish" Tony continued while looking intently at Gibbs "I called Abby and asked her to locate my exact signal through my cell. I then asked her to tell the special operations agents that where stationed outside the airport to put a full luggage container right across my location. When she gave me thumbs up, I talked to you boss," Tony said looking at Gibbs once again "to order the rest of the agents to hold their fire. Then I started talking to Rosenberg trying to get close enough so I could tackle him. I pushed him out the window, we fell on the container, I disarmed him, handcuffed him and let him unconscious, since he was trying to escape. I believe you know the rest" Tony concluded.

Gibbs was looking at Tony with a strange look on his face, while Ziva, McGee and the rest of the agents that had gathered around looked at Tony with awe. A few moments later Gibbs spoke once again.

"You are telling me that all this was part of a plan? That if I call Abby right now she will tell me exactly the same?" Gibbs asked.

"Well," Tony said "Abby didn't know what I needed the luggage carrier for, but apart from that yes, she will tell you exactly the same boss."

Gibbs looked at Tony for a couple of seconds as if he was trying to make sure if he was telling him the truth. He then surprisingly grinned and said; "In that case, good work DiNozzo."

"Really boss?" Tony asked bewildered. He couldn't believe that he had gotten of the hook with nothing but a compliment.

"Yeah, DiNozzo and I will not repeat it again. You acted based on a plan you had formed. A plan which I must add was probably the best you could come up with at the moment. Rosenberg was loosing it. You saved a lot of lives back there." Gibbs said.

Tony was now looking as awestricken as McGee and Ziva. So all he managed to mutter was a; "Thanks boss". Then he remembered something so he asked; "What was this gunshot before everything started going wrong? Did you capture the buyers?"

"I believe I can answer that." Ziva said. "One of the agents in our team, who was closer to the buyers, was stupid enough to try arresting them by himself." She explained to Tony and Gibbs who weren't there at the time, while McGee nodded in agreement. "Then one of the buyers pulled a gun and shot him. The agent was wearing a vest so he wasn't hurt, but the bad was already done." Ziva said.

"The 'damage' not the 'bad' Ziva" Tony said.

"Whatever." Ziva responded.

"Then, if you are not injured DiNozzo, we should return to the office" Gibbs said. "We have some suspects to interrogate".


	7. An Interrogation And Some Hope

Hello again! Before I start, I really, really want to thank my amazing reviewers! As I have mentioned before, you guys are the reason I keep writing this story. So pretty please keep reviewing… (Insert puppy dog eyes here). I wasn't really planning to update so fast, but I wanted to write a Tate scene so badly, that I guess I wrote in super-speed… Anyways, here is the next chapter! (Hint; pay attention to the Tate scene because it will contains crucial information for the rest of the story)

**DISCLAIMER;** I, sadly, don't own any of the NCIS characters mentioned in this fic.

**AN INTERROGATION AND SOME HOPE.**

NCIS office building; interrogation room; 6 thirty in the afternoon.

Tony, after being checked twice by the paramedics, as Gibbs ordered, was finally reaching the interrogation room where Gibbs was trying to crack Rosenberg. So he entered the surveillance room and stood next to McGee and Ziva, who were already there and were at the moment observing Gibbs interrogating Rosenberg.

"How is it going?" Tony asked. "Is Gibbs getting to him yet?"

"If it was any other case, the interrogation would already be over." McGee answered. "But Rosenberg is completely insane."

"I will have to agree with that Probie…" Tony admitted, thinking once again about the scene in the airport. He was ready to ask if Gibbs was planning to interrogate the buyers too, when Abby walked in the room. Once she noticed Tony she let out a gasp and run towards him. For a moment Tony thought she was going to hit him, but she instead pulled him in a bear hug, with no apparent intention to let him go in the near future.

"Why is everybody hugging me today?" Tony asked.

"You jumped out of a window! You could have died you know! And what is worst you actually made me help you jump of that window." Abby said pulling away from Tony. That was when Tony noticed she was close to tears. "How do you think would I feel if you died and I was the one responsible?" She asked.

"I couldn't die, Abby." Tony said looking at Abby and feeling guilty. He knew how much pain she has felt after Kate's death. She and Kate had been really close and her death had cost Abby almost as much it had cost him. "And I couldn't die exactly because I asked you to help me. Once you said that the container was there, I knew I would be fine. I would put my life in your hands everyday Abby." Tony said truthfully.

"You mean that?" Abby said, not believing that Tony had just said something so mature.

"Off course I do" Tony said winking. "By the way, why are you here? I mean besides wanting to see me…" he asked.

"Gibbs asked me to identify the materials of the bomb in case they helped in the interrogation" Abby said.

"What was the explosive?" Ziva wanted to know.

"It was military C-4. It would have blown half of the floor if it had gone off." Abby said. "The exploding mechanism itself was made of Polyvinyl Chloride."

"Polyvinyl Chloride?" Ziva asked.

McGee tried to explain but Tony beat him to the punch. "Basically plastic" He said. "I suppose it makes sense. Plastic is lighter to carry and harder to detect than metal."

"My thoughts exactly." Abby said, a bit surprised Tony knew what Polyvinyl Chloride was.

"So you are trying to tell me that you sold the missiles because you wanted to weaken the army?" Gibbs' angry voice was heard from the interrogation room. They all turned their attention at Gibbs who was now standing behind Rosenberg.

"I don't expect you to understand my noble cause." Rosenberg said, acting indifferently.

Gibbs, who had realized that he couldn't enrage Rosenberg enough to make him talk, decided to change his tactics. "On the contrary" he said "I am a marine myself. I know that the army shouldn't be run by politicians. I just want to know who the buyer of those missiles was."

Once again Rosenberg started feeling comfortable thinking that the person who was talking to him was sharing his believes. So he said; "I only talked with him from the phone. He said he wanted to weaken the army too. He said that things are going wrong in the army. That we were becoming weak and he would show the world just how weak we had become."

Things come together in Gibbs' mind as Rosenberg spoke those words. He turned to Rosenberg and said; "This wasn't so hard now, was it?" And with those words he exited the room. Seconds later he was in the observation room.

"I think you understand who the mastermind behind the purchase of those missiles was?" Gibbs said. Everybody stood in silence, except from Tony who said; "I guess we should call FBI. This seems like their kind of thing."

"You are probably right DiNozzo" Gibbs agreed.

"Sorry boss, but how do you know who the mastermind is?" McGee asked.

Gibbs looked at him and said; "Do you remember that two weeks ago a paramilitary organization that calls itself 'The New Army' threatened to hit a military base with weapon stolen from the army? That is practically what Rosenberg just told us. I don't believe he is a member of the New Army himself though."

"You are probably right boss." Tony agreed. "The members of the New Army are fanatical. If Rosenberg was one of them he would never talk. Anyways, this is an FBI investigation."

"O.k. then. McGee you call the feds and inform them about the case. DiNozzo, David come with me. You have some paperwork to do if I am not mistaken. Abby, what are you doing here?" Gibbs said, giving orders as usual.

Tony smiled sadly as he saw things coming back to normal like the incident in the airport never happened. 'At least as close to normal as it can get without you Kate." he thought. He then turned to follow Gibbs wishing once again to have Kate back.

NCIS office building; nine thirty in the afternoon;

Tony sat at his desk finishing the report he was typing in his computer. He was the last one from the team that still was working with the exception of Gibbs who was at the moment in director Shepard's office explaining what had happened in the airport. Ziva had decided to finish her report tomorrow while McGee had already finished all his paperwork.

'I don't know how he does it. No matter what, Probie always finishes his paperwork in record time.' Tony thought. He typed the last sentence in his report and raised his head from the computer, rubbing the back of his neck, only to face Kate's now empty desk. He had decided to not think about it as Ziva's desk as he just couldn't come to terms with someone claiming it except from Kate. He felt so lost thinking that Kate wasn't there anymore and thinking of that desk as 'Kate's desk' made reality a little less unbearable. He then remembered a talk he had with Kate, while writing their reports after a case was over. He didn't even remembered how their discussion had come to that topic, but he never really needed a specific reason to talk to Kate. He just enjoyed talking to her about everything, just wanted to hear her voice.

'But really, how did we come to talk about something like this?' Tony asked himself.

'Why were we talking about fairytales?'

NCIS office building; March 2004;

"_Come on Kate." Tony asked in a surprised voice. "Are you trying to tell me you never believed in fairytales as a child?"_

"_No Tony I didn't. I mean come on! Princesses rescued by brave princes and living happily ever after? Why should I believe in that type of stuff?" Kate asked seriously._

"_Because everybody has to believe in something better, even if that happens to be a prince in shining armor." Tony answered._

_Kate looked at him with a strange expression plastered on her face. "You know I once had a discussion like this with my grandfather." She said._

"_Did you just compare me with your grandfather Kate?" Tony asked with a mock insulted expression on his face._

"_I don't even know why I am talking to you. You always make f__un of everything." Kate said, feeling a bit angry._

"_Come on Kate; please tell me what you were going to say. I promise I will be serious" Tony begged._

_Kate sighed and said; "When I was a kid my grandfather told me the story of Hansel and Gretel, you know, with the two little children that walk into the woods throwing crumbs of bread to find their way back…"_

"_Yeah, I know" Tony said. "The one with the witch that lived in the gingerbread house."_

"_That's the one." Kate said. "Anyways, I must have been about eight at the time and me and my grandfather got into a 'serious' conversation about this story. I wanted to know why Hansel and Gretel were so stupid to throw bread behind them to find their way home, since everybody knows that bread is what birds eat. He told me that this is how the story goes, but I insisted it was silly. He then asked me what would I do if I was lost in the woods to find my way back home."_

"_And what did you say?" Tony asked._

"_I couldn't thing of a good answer so I looked around my room until I saw a red ribbon on my nightstand. So I told him I would use red ribbons. He asked why and I said that since trees are green anyone could notice a red ribbon in the forest, plus birds wouldn't eat it." Kate answered, blushing a little. "Stupid, right?" she said and returned to her report._

"_I don't thing it's stupid." Tony said seriously._

_Kate however, thought he was once again making fun of her so she said; "Yeah, right. Very funny DiNozzo."_

"_No, I am serious." Tony insisted. "In fact, if you ever feel lost and want to come home, tie a red ribbon somewhere I can see it and I'll come running. I promise Kate."_

'_He can't be serious.' Kate thought, but the look in his eyes told her he was. She had never seen him __act this way before and for some reason his seriousness right at that moment made her feel safe and warm. Not knowing what to say, she stopped staring at him and went back to work._

_Tony soon followed her example. He didn't know why he said what he had said, but he knew that he meant it with all of his heart. A few moments latter, when he raised his head from the computer screen, he caught a glimpse of Kate, still blushing a bit, with a faint smile on her lips, while she was finishing her report. He, for a reason he hadn't yet realized, felt more proud than he had ever felt knowing he was the reason for her smile. _

'I should have done something back there.' Tony thought. 'I shouldn't have left all this time to pass…' However he didn't have time to complete his trail of thought, since he was interrupted surprisingly not by Gibbs, but by Ducky.

"Hello, Anthony do you hear me? You looked pretty lost back there." Ducky said.

"Sorry Ducky." Tony said. "I was lost in my thoughts for a moment. How comes you are here?" he asked.

"Oh you see, my car broke down and Jethro said he would give me a lift, but I guess he is too absorbed talking to the director. By the way, excellent work today. Abby told me that the operation was based remotely on your information." Ducky said.

"It was nothing really." Tony said. "I just followed the red ribbons." He added with a sad smile.

"Excuse me? The red what?" Ducky asked confused.

"It's nothing. Just something personal I guess." Tony answered.

"However, Abby also told me about the window incident. She was close to tears when she told me and I can understand her. I don't want any other members of the team on my table, Anthony." Ducky said with a serious voice.

Tony felt his heart shatter once again as he remembered Kate's body laying on one of Ducky's tables. The pain he felt was so intense that it must have shown on his face, because Ducky said; "I know Kate's death was hard on you Anthony. I have enough life experience …"

'No, Ducky. Not now. Please not another one of your 'I remember when…' stories' Tony thought.

ButDucky just said; "… to recognize love when I see it."

To say that Tony was surprised would be the understatement of the century. He tried to tell Ducky that he was wrong, but instead he let out a sigh and said; "At least someone found out before it was too late. You know Ducky somewhere deep in my heart I still believethat she is alive. Stupid, right?"

Ducky looked at Tony like he was trying to decide weather he should tell him something or not. Finally, after a couple of seconds, he said with a strange voice; "Always trust your heart Anthony."

Tony now looked more surprised than before. "What do you mean by…" he started to ask, but Ducky just said like nothing had happened; "I should go and see what is taking Jethro so long. It's getting late and I'm tired. Goodnight Anthony." And with that he headed towards the directors office, leaving behind a very confused agent DiNozzo who was thinking; 'What was that all about?'


	8. Have Yourself A Merry Little Murder

Hi there! I really want to apologize for the delay in posting this chapter… Sorry guys if I could postpone midterm exams, I would but… Ugh, you get the picture! Anyways, thanks again to my amazing reviewers! Love you guys! As far as the story is concerned these will be the last two chapters before… you guessed it! Kate makes her first appearance! These chapters are about a case I've been working on that I was dieing to put in the story. So keep sharp, keep reviewing and on with the story.

**DISCLAIMER;** I, sadly, don't own any of the NCIS characters mentioned in this fic.

**HAVE YOURSELF A MERRY LITTLE MURDER.**

NCIS office building; 23rd of December; 7 thirty in the morning;

Tony was, as usual for the past month, the first one to arrive in the office. However he was unusually unhappy for this time of the year. But Christmas was two days away and as everyone was getting more excited about the holidays he was getting gloomier by the second.

'Christmas is supposed to be the time of the year you spend with the ones you love.' He thought while turning on his computer. 'And the one I love the most is Kate…' He let out a sigh, while wishing he could turn back the clock to last year's Christmas, when Kate was still alive. He couldn't escape thinking of Kate so instead he tried to focus on his case for the day.

During the past month the team didn't have any major cases, but Tony had managed to be very efficient with the ones they had. As a matter of fact last week he had solved an abduction case of a female officer just by looking at her diary. It turned out that it was her ex boyfriend (and now stalker) that had done it.

'Off course, since he was a complete nut case,' Tony thought 'it wasn't really difficult to prove him guilty. His prints were all over officer Davis house, not to mention we found officer Davis herself in his basement…' he chuckled to himself.

'Yep, that definitely proved my point'.

He was at the moment working on one of the most bizarre cases in his days as a NCIS agent; the victims -all rich navy male officers- were taken by their houses, only to be found dead exactly twenty four hours after their abduction. The body count was up to three dead officers; two admirals and a base commander. All coming of wealthy families, all married and all middle aged.

'And off course all were found with a mocking note and a seemingly random object near their bodies.' The note was always the same;

_Revenge is finally within my grasp_

_The traitor's life lies now in past_

_As Christmas time draws near_

_The rest of them should flee in fear_

_Because their end is finally here…_

'That is exactly what was missing from my life.' Tony thought as he let out a sigh. 'A poetical murderer… Feels like I am trapped in a very bad movie or something. Wonder what is going to be next; a musical mass murderer perhaps?' He chuckled once again at that thought. 'Exactly what Gibbs needs to get a heart attack. If this case doesn't give him one that is. One more coffee and he will surely explode.' He concluded.

After that small pleasant break, in which the mental image of Gibbs's head exploding was dominant, he decided to re-examine all that he had come up with last night. He had actually spent almost the whole night in frond of his computer screens -now that he had finally managed to connect all three of them- trying to put the pieces together. 'It is completely certain that these murders are personal. The killer himself classifies the victims as 'traitors'. That means he thinks they had in a way betrayed him in the past.' he thought. He had off course hacked into the army data base to see if he could find something that connected the victims, but all he thought was relevant was a sealed file in their respective bios. He had tried to hack in those files too, but he realized they were well protected and could only be accessed by specific terminals in the Pentagon, or probably by CIA computers.

'That is intriguing.' Tony thought. 'It is possible that the case breaker lies inside those files.' But since he couldn't access them he had decided to work with what was provided to him. So, he turned once again to the crime photos he had taken at the dump sites of the bodies. They were all shot once at their heads, clearly executed, dressed in their uniforms, which were also taken from their houses, with the note in one hand and a different object each time in the other hand.

'And that is exactly what might help us solving the case.' Tony thought. 'The killer himself is leaving back clues.' As he had realized last night, seconds before succumbing to the intriguing thought of viciously attacking his computer after five hours of finding nothing, he had a revelation. Then off course, he had to restrain himself from hitting his head against the wall. 'How could I have missed it before?' he thought. 'I guess Kate was right; I can be a complete idiot sometimes'. Trying to ignore the stabbing he felt in his heart whenever thinking of Kate, he composed his thoughts once again.

'The object found with the first victim' he thought while looking at admiral Crawford's picture 'was a Chinese tea cup. In the beginning it looked insignificant,' Tony thought 'but it turned out that the wife of Admiral Jacobs (who was the second victim) has a vast collection of Chinese tea cups.' He thought, being unable not to wonder why would someone bother to collect Chinese cups at all.

'Anyways, with Admiral Jacobs's body, a copy of an Aztec coin was found.' He thought. To his astonishment Mary Hollander, the wife of Commander Hollander, who was the third victim, turned out to be an archeologist who specified in the Aztec civilization. 'So it is quite probable that the murderer is using the wives of his victims to leave clues as to whom his next victim will be.'

However, what confused him the most was the object found with Commander Hollander's body. It was a whip that he had recognized as the same type he used when his mother forced him to take horse riding lessons for three years. He was at the moment searching with his computer anything he could find about the wives of navy officers who fit the profile of the other victims but to no avail. He was getting more frustrated by the minute, not only because he couldn't find anything but because he had noticed the murderer's timetable.

'He kills every five days' he thought anxiously. 'That makes his time to attack again the 24th of December, in other words tomorrow. And if we take his note seriously, which I can't find any reason why not to, he plans to make this victim his last. If that is the case, he might disappear afterwards.' He realized. 'This might be our last chance to get to him.' While making these undeniably gloom thoughts, he finally found what he was looking for.

In order to cover all bases, he had extended his research to private e-mails of the possible victims and their families. He was at the moment looking at an e-mail of one Admiral Buxton's daughter that wrote; _'Yes, Jenny the dinner party will be held tomorrow night at our mansion. I know it is a creepy way to pass Christmas Eve with the fog and the forest next to the house, but since your parents are coming, please try to make it too. I am afraid that my mother will spend the whole night talking about her new stupid horse, boring me to hell. Sometimes I feel she cares more about those creatures than me and my father…'_

And the e-mail continued in the same tone with Buxton's daughter trying to convince this Jenny to come to the party. Tony however was already checking Admiral Buxton's personal files. "Let's see" he whispered to himself while going through Buxton's file. 'He is undeniably wealthy, middle aged and married, so he fits the victims' profile.' He thought and then felt a sudden rush of excitement as he saw that Buxton's personal file contained a sealed file like the other victims. He tried to hack into it but the result was the same as with the other files.

'O.k. not bad DiNozzo.' He thought. 'I have the next victim but I still need to see what is inside these sealed files.' As he wondered what he should do next he heard the elevator doors opening. He mechanically turned his head to see Ziva walking towards Kate's desk. As he was preparing for yet another painful moment of watching Ziva sitting at Kate's desk, he found the answer to his problem surprisingly in one of Gibbs's many rules; _'Always work as a team.'_

He wondered for the second time in that day why he hadn't thought of this solution earlier. If anyone of the people he knew had the right connections to the CIA to be able to see what was inside those files, that would be Ziva. So he prepared to ignore the now familiar painful agony he felt whenever Ziva sat at Kate's desk and got ready to greet her more warmly than he ever had. He figured that since he was going to exploit her connections in CIA he could at least try to be nice to her. He just hoped she wouldn't take it the wrong way. Though he pretended to be oblivious, he hadn't failed to notice the looks she gave him from times to times. He wasn't ignorant of the looks most of the women that worked in the building gave him either, but he just didn't care enough to tell them he was no longer interested in one night stands.

As she came closer he rose from his chair and sat at the corner of his desk looking at her, with a small and as worm as he could manage smile on his lips. Apparently, that was enough to stop her marching towards Kate's desk and look at him with a half confused and half undeniably happy look on her face. That was the moment Tony decided to speak.

"Good morning, Ziva" he said with a smooth voice. "How was your night?" He tried to sound really interested as to how her night had been, and to his surprise it seemed to work, because she said;

"G-Great. I didn't do anything special though. I just stayed home and read a book."

Tony noticed she was beyond glad he was interested in how she spent the night, so he couldn't resist to take it a bit further. So he assumed a surprised look, crossed his arms across his chest (a movement that he knew would only make his toned upper body stand out more under his already tight black V-neck blouse) and said;

"Are you trying to tell me that a woman like you spends her night alone in her house?" And then making his voice sound a bit deeper he added; "Now, why should I believe that?" However he automatically realized that he might had taken it too far, since he saw her blushing furiously while trying to take her eyes from his chest and in the same time form a coherent answer to his question.

"Well," she managed to mutter with a slightly trembling voice some seconds later "I am still trying to adjust here and all this pressure from this new case doesn't leave me much free time…" She seemed unable to continue so he decided to ask her what he was planning from the beginning. He did however try to make the transition from the one subject to the other as smooth as possible.

"You know, I was working on our new case" he said, watching her tremble a bit once hearing the word 'our' "and I found something that might be the key to solving it. But I believe that only you can help me with that." He added while thinking; 'A little fluttery never hurt anyone.'

She flushed once again and then croaked; "Really".

Tony fought the urge to roll his eyes and said getting impatient; "But off course. You are probably the person with the most connections with every secret service in the world." And then he added in order to flutter her; "I don't thing that I could manage to gather that many connections even if I tried my whole life. I guess that is a talent of yours I don't posses." 'Maybe the last comment was too much', he thought, 'but it definitely did the trick.'

"I would be glad to help if I can." Ziva answered looking excited from the compliment. "What do you want me to do?" she then asked.

"I found some sealed files while searching for information on the victims and I might know who the next victim is, but I need to see what is in those files." He explained. "Can you help me with that?"

"Sure, I know someone in the CIA that owes me a favor." She answered and then asked with a confused look; "Did you just say you know who the next victim is?"

"Yes, I think I know the name of the next victim," Tony answered "but I need this file to find out who the murderer is and why he is doing it. I will explain how I know once Probie and Gibbs get here." He got closer to Ziva as he spoke and that seemed to be all it took to stop her from asking any more questions. She sat at her office, oblivious to the pain that simple movement had caused Tony to feel, and said while removing her coat;

"O.k. then. Let me make that phone call."

Tony waited expectantly while she was talking and couldn't help a little smile of victory when she said; "Fine then. Send me the file to my computer." She then looked at him with her face glowing once she saw him smiling and said; "We should have the file any second now." She then looked at her computer and said; "Here it is."

Tony walked next to her chair and bended over taking a closer look at the computer screen. He heard her take a short breath, apparently affected by their proximity, but in order not to embarrass her, he pretended not to notice and started reading the file.

As he read, his expression turned brighter and brighter, the pieces of the case finally falling into place. Ziva, who was too observed looking at his face to actually read the file saw his expression and asked sounding a bit breathless; "Did you find what you hoped to find?"

"As a matter of fact I did." Tony said with the faint smile, which had replaced his usual wide grin ever since Kate's death, on his face. He then looked straight at Ziva's eyes making her blush for the third time in ten minutes and said a simple "Thank you" that made her look at him like he had just confessed his undying love for her.

Right about when he was starting to feel uncomfortable and the same time secretly wishing that he could once see Ziva's present expression on Kate's face, McGee entered the office. Tony found the excuse he needed to pull away from Ziva, relieved that this awkward moment was over. Ziva on the other hand seemed ready to kill McGee on the spot.

Tony, who remembered what Ziva was capable of, decided to lighten the mood with the only way he thought possible. By teasing McGee. "Right on time Probie." He said, with humor evident in his voice. "If you were a few more minutes late we would have to start the next case without you."

McGee looked confused once again. "What next case? What happened to the old one?" he asked.

"Relax Probie." Tony said. "There is no next case. But you almost missed me explaining the solution to the one we are working now."

McGee just gapped. Tony looked annoyed. 'What is the matter with him?' he thought. 'Can't he yet believe that I can actually solve cases too?'

Then McGee composed himself and said; "Have you told Gibbs yet?"

"No, he hasn't come yet." Tony answered. He was about to tease McGee some more since he was still a bit irritated by his reaction, but he never had the chance as Gibbs walked in the office.

He was holding a cup of coffee as usual and, also as usual in the morning, was looking pissed off. He stopped in frond of McGee, who hadn't yet made it to his desk and said looking at Tony and him; "If you haven't solved the case yet, you shouldn't spend time pointlessly standing in the middle of the office." He then turned to leave, but was stopped by Tony who simply stated;

"And if we have solved the case?"

Gibbs turned and looked at him surprised, but he soon managed to cover the said surprise with his normal serious expression and said to Tony; "DiNozzo if you are joking you are in serious trouble."

"It's good that I'm not joking then." Tony answered seriously.

"Then what are you waiting for?" Gibbs asked.

Tony took a deep breath and started explaining how he found out the connection between the victims, who the next victim was and finally, what was exactly in the sealed file.

"So, what was inside this file?" Gibbs asked.

"I was getting to that boss." Tony said. "The file was about a trial that took place in 1975. Turns out that commander Hollander and admirals Jacobs, Crawford and Buxton knew each other back then. In the file it says that the four of them, along with a man called Aaron Walker, also coming from a wealthy family, went to the army together. Walker was accused of stealing military secrets and selling them to the Russians. He used his friends as his alibis, saying he was with them the night of the theft of some weapon blueprints, counting on them to cover his back. However, once they found out what he had done they testified that he wasn't with them at that night. His money were the most probable reason why he wasn't sent away for life. His lawyer managed to persuade the court that he was misguided as to what exactly he was giving to the Russians, so he got away with thirty years. He was relished two months ago and seems to have disappeared since then." He concluded.

Gibbs looked at him and said; "Everything seems to fit except for one thing. Why is he using objects related to the victims' wives and not the victims themselves?" he asked.

"I think I have the answer to that question too boss." Tony said. "When he was convicted, Walker was engaged to a woman named Susan Michel, who broke their engagement just after his conviction."

"Why is this relevant?" McGee wanted to know.

"Admiral Buxton's wife is called Susan. Her maiden name is Michel. It seems that after Walker was sent to jail, she got engaged to Buxton and married him a couple of years later." Tony said. "I believe that is the reason why he is so obsessed with their wives and why he left Admiral Buxton as his last victim." He explained.

"I believe we should pay a visit to Admiral Buxton immediately." And saying that he turned to leave. He looked at them over his shoulder and just said; "Why are you still standing there?"

Tony let out a sigh and reached for his jacket. He had a feeling that the next two days were going to be really long…


	9. A Chase In The Forest

Hi there! As you probably noticed I am posting a new chapter… I am a bit sad though… NO reviews on my last chapter… I mean come on guys; you know I absolutely love reviews… Anyways, this is the last chapter before Kate makes her first appearance. I will try to post it as soon as possible, but please (pretty, pretty please) review!

**DISCLAIMER;** I, sadly, don't own any of the NCIS characters mentioned in this fic.

**A CHASE IN THE FOREST.**

Somewhere in the woods near Admiral Buxton's mansion; 10 thirty in the morning;

Tony looked out from the back window of the car as they approached Admiral Buxton's mansion. He was basically surprised by the location of the mansion. 'No wonder Buxton's daughter said spending Christmas Eve in this place would be creepy.' Tony thought.

Outside his window he could see a vast forest area, filled with what seemed to be some huge oak trees. It was a bit difficult to pin point the exact type of the trees he was looking at, since everything was covered by a vale of thick fog. 'For some 'weird' reason,' Tony thought 'this doesn't look a lot like a cheerful snowy Christmas landscape.' And he was right. 'Everything in this place looks a bit… well, creepy I suppose, in lack of better words.' He thought and then added; 'It looks like one of those places that must look amazing during spring and summer and like Sleepy Hollow the rest of the time.'

He was however brought back from his trance as he heard Gibbs, who was up to that moment on the phone with Admiral Buxton, informing them they should be reaching the mansion in a matter of minutes.

"O.k. everybody. We will soon be reaching the mansion. I want you all on your best behaviors." For a moment he looked at Tony, ready to give him his usual extra warning only to remember it would no longer be necessary. So he just said; "Admiral Buxton is highly respected in the navy. He is a war hero and not to mention an important factor in Washington." Giving everyone a stern look to emphasize what he was saying, he continued; "At the moment in the mansion we will find Admiral's wife Susan and her daughter Anne as well as most of the staff, since tomorrow they are having some sort of party."

'Does he even know that tomorrow is Christmas Eve?' Tony thought. 'He almost looked surprised about the party…'

"You are by no chance in liberty to tell them about the reason of our visit. Admiral Buxton has already been informed about everything and we have agreed we will pretend to be staying there as a guard provided by the government for tomorrow's party." Ziva gave Gibbs an annoyed look once hearing the word 'guard'. Gibbs however seemed not to notice anything so he just kept going on;

"As you probably noticed the killer is going to strike tomorrow according to his timetable. As he seems prone to theatricals, if you have noticed the notes, it is most possible that he will make his move tomorrow, during the party, just to make the greatest impact." While Gibbs was saying that, everybody nodded in agreement.

"That means" he said while taking a swift turn, "that we have a little more than a day to make ourselves familiar with the house and the Buxtons. Admiral Buxton himself is at the moment in Washington and will arrive tomorrow, two hours before the beginning of the party, so it is highly impossible that Walker will make his move before that time. As you might have also noticed, we will have to spend the night at the mansion, so try not to break anything." He said in a casual voice, but looked intently at McGee.

He then took another turn and an enormous mansion came in sight. From the mere look of it, Tony could see that it was an eighteenth century colonial building with some Grecian elements, that had at least three floors and something that seemed like a huge stable in the distance, near the forest line. He could already see the commotion coming from the working personnel that was getting everything ready for the party next night.

'This is a first one.' He thought as they approached the main gates.

Buxton Mansion; 11 in the morning;

'Except from a first one, this is also going to be uncomfortable' Tony thought. They had just been introduced to the female Buxtons. The mother, Susan, was blonde with her hair curled in an elegant bun at the back of her neck. She had soft blue eyes and seemed to be unaffected by time. The daughter, Anne, was as blonde as her mother but her hair was cut right bellow her chin and her eyes were a bright shade of green. 'They are both beautiful' Tony thought 'and I am afraid that I got their attention… Great! I have barely set foot on this place and now this. As if it wasn't enough that I have to spend Christmas Eve in this annoying festive atmosphere, now I have groupies too. Kudos for me!' However, he didn't let any of those thoughts to come forth and show up on his face. Instead he kept his oblivious façade on and introduced himself with a polite;

"Agent Tony DiNozzo, pleased to meet you." He pretended to ignore their appreciative and in the case of Anne, who by her posture Tony guessed to be first or second year in college, seductive glances.

He then paid close attention to the tour of the house, trying to locate all the possible exits and entrances of it. While looking out of the window he noticed something intriguing, so he decided to ask;

"I noticed that there is no fence between the gardens and the forest by that side of the house. Isn't that possibly dangerous, I mean with all the wild animals in the forest?" He had used the wild animals as an excuse so that he wouldn't worry Anne or Susan and it seemed to have worked, because Susan said with a light voice looking once again appreciatively at Tony; "I like to ride the horses to the forest from time to time and it is much more simple to access it from here instead of taking the long route through the main entrance." She explained.

"Plus we don't have anything to fear with you around, right agent?" Anne added with a flirty voice and a mischievous grin. She then, without allowing Tony to answer, proceeded to the next room giving Tony another flirty look on the way. Gibbs, off course, noticed that little exchange and gave Tony a mock angry glance. Tony just shook his shoulders in a very 'not my fault' way and followed an oblivious McGee and a furious Ziva to the next room.

Buxton Mansion; Stables; 12 thirty in the afternoon;

It had been almost an hour and a half since Tony had entered the mansion and he had finally finished pacing around the gardens and the main house. He was glad that there seemed to be no other breech in the security of the mansion with the exception of the forest exit. They were now approaching the stables and Susan seemed eager to explain everyone -and especially Tony- everything she knew about horses. All that time, Anne appeared to be incredibly bored about what her mother was saying, but completely absorbed by Tony, much to his discomfort.

'I know you are laughing at me right now Kate.' Tony thought while trying to hide his discomfort. It was however difficult to ignore Anne who was 'accidentally' tripping every two minutes and used Tony as a way to hold her balance.

'I wonder what would happen if I moved a bit while she is trying to grab my hand…' he thought teasingly but quickly added; 'No, bad Tony! This would be hilarious but unprofessional…' So he ignored another 'accidental' tripping from Anne and tried to focus on what Susan was talking about. They had by now already entered the stables and Susan was showing them her new horse, the one Anne had mentioned to her friend Jenny in her e-mail.

The horse itself was a tall, young and still kind of wild stallion of black color and was at the moment being led in the middle of the stable by a man who seemed to be his trainer.

"Tornado is getting ready for his walk." Susan explained. "We are taking him out every night in order to get all the exercise he needs."

As Tony was thinking how much deprived of imagination one must be to name a horse Tornado, the said horse, obviously annoyed by the sudden commotion, broke free from his instructor and rose to his back two feet. Tony acted on instinct, remembering his riding lessons from all those years ago. He used his right hand to catch Tornado's leash and once he lowered the horse's head to his eye level, he used his left and stroke Tornado's head slightly, while whispering with taming certainty in his voice in order to calm him.

"Come on boy." Tony whispered. "Nobody is going to hurt you."

It worked almost instantly. The horse calmed down and Tony handed it to his trainer, who swiftly moved it a bit further in case it got annoyed once again. Tony took a look at his fellow agents and the Buxton women. Gibbs, Ziva and McGee looked clearly surprised while Susan and Anne looked excited. Susan was the one to speak first, joy clear in her voice;

"I didn't know you knew your way around horses, agent DiNozzo." She said.

Tony smiled slightly and just answered; "Oh, I used to take horse riding lessons in the past." The awestricken look on Anne's face didn't escape him. 'Apparently she isn't all that attracted at horses' Tony thought a little amused 'but her dislike doesn't seem to extend to their riders'.

"I should apologize however." Susan continued. "Tornado isn't usually that easily annoyed. He just isn't used to being around new people. We are actually teaching him to approach as by whistling those days…" Then however, Anne interrupted;

"I bet Tony can make Tornado approach him!" She said clapping her hands happily.

'No more 'agent DiNozzo' then.' Tony thought as he heard Anne using his name.

"Off course you should try agent DiNozzo!" Susan agreed, looking as happy as her daughter. "Go on give it a try." She said.

Since he saw no reaction from Gibbs, except an amused smile, Tony put his fingers in his mouth and whistled. To his surprise, Tornado broke free once again from his instructor and moved towards him.

"Brilliant!" Susan exclaimed as she watched Tony patting Tornado's head. "From now on, as long you are in his hearing range, Tornado will recognize your whistle and will come to you within seconds."

Tony couldn't find the words to answer and thankfully he didn't have to, since Gibbs finally decided to speak;

"Forgive us Mrs. Buxton," he said looking at Susan "but since we are going to spend the night here, we should probably go and fetch our clothes for the night and for the party tomorrow. We might not have time afterwards."

"But off course." She said a bit disappointed. "We will escort you to you car." And saying that, she followed Gibbs, who had already exited the stables. Tony followed her example, ignoring once again the bewildered look from McGee and the adoring looks from Anne and Ziva.

December 24th; Buxton mansion; 10 thirty in the afternoon;

Tony was standing at the main hall of the mansion trying to blend in with the guests. It wasn't very difficult to tell the truth; his suit was undoubtedly the most expensive one among the agents and suited him perfectly. His attire included a black suit, a white shirt and a tight black vest without a tie (as the latest fashion style commanded).

His hair was once again carefully messed up, giving him a flirty look. His looks off course hadn't helped with Anne's and her girl friend's reaction toward him. Although last night and the whole day Tony was carefully avoiding Anne and Susan, he was no longer able to come up with a viable excuse to leave the room.

'Focus DiNozzo.' He thought to himself. 'You have to catch a crazed killer if you remember.'

Admiral Buxton had come to the mansion about two hours ago and was at the moment talking to Gibbs trying not to look too worried. Tony had given him and all the other agents that had come to the party as 'bodyguards', a short briefing on the case as well as a recent photograph of Walker. He was a man in his sixties, with medium height and weight, gray hair (which were now probably colored) and black eyes. All they could do was wait for him to move in order to arrest him.

December 24th; Buxton mansion; 11 thirty in the afternoon;

Tony had already passed countless invitations for a dance and was getting more irritated by the minute. It had been an hour and Walker hadn't made his move yet. Tony had started doubting himself; what if he was wrong about the victims? What if someone else was getting killed right now because of him, while they were protecting Buxton and his wife?

'No!' He thought to himself 'None of this! Not now! I am right; all the evidence pointed to this direction. I simply can't be wrong. I'm not letting Kate down…' However, as he was fighting with his madness, he heard Ziva through his earpiece;

"We have movement behind Admiral Buxton and his family!"

Tony's head turned slowly so that he wouldn't let anyone suspect something bad was happening, but inside he was boiling as he saw the man Ziva had talked about; he knew in a fraction of a second it was Walker. His black eyes were unable to miss. He was dressed like a waiter and was slowly approaching Buxton and his family. Tony however couldn't see more details as his sight was blocked by some of the guests. He heard McGee however who said;

"Watch out; he has a gun!"

'Well off course he has a gun…' Tony thought. 'With my luck we are lucky he doesn't carry a canon!' Then he heard Gibbs saying;

"Move carefully and make the arrest. He is highly dangerous, so as I said move carefully." He ordered.

But it was too late. Walker had already notice the agents approaching so he moved as quickly as humanly possible; He grabbed the Buxton that was closer to him, Anne, and pulled out his gun shooting once in the air;

"Nobody moves!" he shouted. "One move and I will not hesitate to kill her!"

Tony heard Anne screaming and trying to run away, but to no avail. Walker was leading her outside, trough the balcony doors.

'Damn!' Tony thought. 'He is taking her to the forest's side. If he makes it to the forest we might never catch him!' He then heard Gibbs ordering as Walker made it to the garden;

"Agents follow him. Don't let him reach the forest!"

A shout was heard and then the roaring of what seemed to be a bike's engine coming to life. Tony run outside along with the other agents, only to meet the sight of a terrified Anne being consulted by Ziva and Walker who was fleeing towards the woods riding a bike, already out of their shooting range.

He looked around trying to find something that would help him reach Walker in time. Although he couldn't find anything he came up with a rather weird idea. But since he had no other option, he took a couple of steps forward and put his fingers on his lips.

'You better be watching this Kate.' He thought and then whistled as loud as he could manage. For a couple of seconds everybody went silent and looked at him like he had gone crazy. However their concerned looks turned to awe, as they heard at first and then saw Tornado approaching. Tony acted fast; he got rid of his suit as it would narrow his movements and with one swift movement, he jumped onto Tornado's back and followed Walker, oblivious to the awestricken expressions on the faces of his colleagues and the rest of the onlookers.

In seconds he was closing the space between himself and Walker. They had now reached the forest and Tony could move much swifter on horseback than Walker on his bike.

Tony was now on shooting range. 'I'd better get him back alive' he thought 'or Gibbs is going to kill me…' He aimed for Walkers right arm and shot at the very much surprised ex Lieutenant and now fugitive. The first shot hit a tree as Walker rode pass it. The second one hit his right arm exactly at the shoulder blade. That was enough to make Walker loose his balance an fall from his bike. Tony jumped off Tornado's back and approached Walker with his gun aiming at him the whole time. He kicked Walker's weapon that had landed about two feet far from Walker himself further away.

'No more surprises.' he said to himself. Then he addressed a still clearly confused Walker as he handcuffed him; "Are we going somewhere?" He then dragged him away from the pile of metal that used to be his bike, hit his head 'accidentally' at a tree, leaving him unconscious, put him on Tornado's bike and climbed on himself. He then took the road back to the mansion.

As he exited the forest, he heard clapping from the crowd near the house and saw the rest of the agents that had just reached the edge of the forest. He ignored the looks of adoration that came from his female colleagues (Ziva included) and chuckled a bit with McGee's awestricken expression thinking; 'If Probie keeps giving me these looks, his face will probably stay this way. Too bad for Abby I guess…' he thought and chuckled once again remembering the looks Abby had been giving McGee for the past months.

He then saw Gibbs who looked half bewildered and half amused. "You decided to chase a killer on horseback DiNozzo?" he managed to ask.

"I used whatever I could find boss." Tony said coolly, receiving some more amazed looks from the rest of the agents. He climbed down from Tornado's back and patted his head as he gave him to an agent so that they could finally get Walker under arrest properly.

He suddenly felt something cold touching his face. He looked up and realized it had started snowing. He took a look at his watch and realized it was five minutes past twelve. He then closed his eyes and tried to tune out the questions and the talking around him. He focused instead of the most beautiful thing that had happened to his life. He thought of Kate. He thought of her face, of her scent, of her laughter. And for a wonderful moment he felt like she was with him again, alive and happy as she should be.

'Merry Christmas, Kate. Merry Christmas my love.' He thought, allowing himself some time away from a cold reality without Kate.


	10. Hope Made Of Silk

Hi guys! Finally, I got some reviews! Thank you soooooooo much guys! Please keep reviewing and I will keep updating, promise! I also promise that from now on there will be more Tate action than ever! And don't worry; Kate will be back for good in a couple of chapters! Here is her first appearance; I hope you'll enjoy! And remember; reviews make writers happy…

**DISCLAIMER;** I, sadly, don't own any of the NCIS characters mentioned in this fic.

**HOPE MADE OF SILK**

January 25th; outside the NCIS office building; 4 thirty in the afternoon;

'How did it all come down to this?' Tony thought, trying to take better cover behind a black van that was parked in the NCIS parking lot. The whole team (agents Gibbs, McGee, David and off course Tony) were taking cover behind the parked cars, trying to avoid the enemy fire.

'How did they manage to get so close without being noticed?' Tony thought while trying to escape death and the same time shoot back to their attackers.

'This was supposed to be just a car ride to a safe location. We weren't supposed to be attacked right in frond of the office…' Tony took a quick look around, making sure that the rest of the team was still alive and kicking. Gibbs was the one closer to him; he looked absolutely concentrated and had already taken down one of their attackers. Ziva was stationed behind a red convertible and was at the moment focused on firing back. McGee was situated right next to Ziva and, despite his lack of experience in situations like this one, he was holding his own. A shot came from a rooftop across the office building.

'Snipers!' Tony thought frantically. 'Snipers are never good news…' his mind wondered for a second to his last encounter with a sniper; Ari. He had taken the most valuable thing in his life away from him that day. He took his Kate. He took his heart.

'No! Focus on the attackers in frond of you DiNozzo!' He ordered himself. 'You are out of his shooting range. You can deal with him later.' He re-examined the situation; there were six attackers in total. Four were shooting in frond of him, one was dead or fatally injured by Gibbs and the other one was obviously the shooter on the rooftop. He took a look through the windows of the van and saw an opportunity; one of the attackers was trying to go around the car he was hiding behind, so he could hit Gibbs from the side.

'Do not hesitate.' He thought to himself as he aimed from where he was hiding and shot Gibbs's murderer wannabe. He hit him in the head, so he knew it was over. At the same time he saw Ziva with the corner of his eye taking another one of the attackers down.

'Two down, two to go.' He thought only to correct himself after Gibbs fired yet another shot. 'Scratch that. Three down, one to go.' He then looked around for the last attacker. What he saw however made his heart skip a beat; the last attacker had somehow managed to sneak behind them and was ready to take a shot at McGee.

Tony was the only one that had seen him. He knew he didn't have time to warn Probie, as he knew that if he wanted to save him he would have to shoot the attacker himself. To get a clear shot however, in order not to risk injuring Gibbs, who was standing right between his and McGee's location, he had to stand up, ruining his cover. Not seeing any other possible option, he rose up and took the shot; the attacker was dead before he hit the ground. The whole team looked at him. Tony closed his eyes at their expressions. Their faces didn't look happy that McGee was saved. They didn't even look surprised by Tony's sudden action.

Their expressions were the same mask of dread and agony. Off course Tony knew the reason for their reaction. He had known since he rose to take the shot that had saved McGee's life. He knew that by standing up he had given the sniper a clear shot at him. He also knew that right now his colleagues could see the little red spot right between his eyes.

'A bit poetical' Tony thought 'to die the way she did, protecting a friend. At least I will see her again…' He knew the end was near. For a moment as he held his eyes closed, he thought he saw her face and a wave of tranquility washed over him; 'If being with her means that I have to die,' he thought 'then it's a price I am willing to pay.'

All he managed to whisper, mostly to himself, since he knew no one could hear him was; "I love you Kate."

Then, he heard a gunshot and he knew it was all over.

NCIS office building; January 25th; 4 in the afternoon;

Tony was working on a report he was supposed to submit until the end of the day. As usually McGee had finished his paperwork and Ziva was just beginning to do hers.

'So boring.' Tony thought. 'We haven't had a good case since Christmas…' He had to seriously fight with his oncoming chuckle. 'Abby will never leave forget about the whole 'chase the bad guy through the forest while on horseback' stand of mine.' He mused. 'And since I am so lucky, I should have expected that one of the guests would have a camera with him.' He added a bit annoyed. He had to watch the whole chase over and over again. Plus that after the news had spread around, he had somewhat become the talk of the office. 'I mean I can get it with jumping off windows and riding horses through forests, but what good all this fame does if Kate isn't here to know?'

He sighed adding the final sentences in his report. 'I thought time was supposed to heal all wounds' he said to himself starring at his computer screen pointlessly for a couple of seconds. Well that must be the worst lie I've ever heard.' And it was true. The pain he felt while thinking about Kate had only intensified during the past month. And with no serious case to distract him Tony actually felt worse than ever.

'I swear if nothing new and exciting doesn't happen soon, I am going to snap. I can't stop thinking of her and the nightmares do nothing but get worse all the time…'

He was having nightmares ever since Kate got shot on that rooftop. The scene was always the same; He saw Kate right in front of him giving him one of her amazing smiles that never failed to make his heart beat faster every time. He wanted to run hold her in his arms and tell her he loved her. He really did. But since it was nothing but a dream, nothing but a nightmare, he couldn't move from his place. Then he always saw the red spot right in the middle of her forehead. He tried to scream to her, to tell her to move, to save herself, only to discover his voice wouldn't come out. And then…

Tony let out a gasp remembering Kate getting shot. 'Don't think about it DiNozzo.' he ordered himself. 'It is enough that you dream about it every night. Damn! Am I talking to myself I second person now? I must be loosing it…'

"Is everything o.k. Tony?" Tony looked up from his computer only to see Ziva looking at him with a worried expression on her face.

'She must have heard me gasping' he thought.

"No, I am perfectly fine." He lied. "Just a bit bored with writing my report, I guess." It was always a bit uncomfortable to be around Ziva; she made her feelings toward Tony quite clear during the past month and he wasn't sure as to how to tell her he wasn't interested without hurting her feelings. To tell the truth, since the whole horse riding episode, it was a bit uncomfortable to be near to any female agent in the office. Ziva however seemed to thing his report excuse was the truth since she said with a knowing look; "Yeah, I know. I hate writing reports too. I wish we could get a new case. This is really…" But she didn't get a chance to finish her sentence. However, it seemed that she got her wish as Gibbs exited director Shepard's office, looking more pissed of than ever;

"DiNozzo, McGee, David; get here right now!" He ordered.

'This is going to be fun…' Tony thought looking at Gibbs's angry face. 'I wonder who is going to ask him what happened. Surely not me.' It turned out that the brave one that day was McGee who asked in the most professional tone he could manage;

"What happened boss?" He asked, waiting for the outbreak. And off course it came;

"Retarded federal agents McGee, that is what happened." Gibbs yelled back.

"What do you mean boss?" Tony asked, curiosity overwhelming his fear of an enraged Gibbs.

"Do you remember two months ago when we arrested Rosenberg for trying to sell imported missiles from Russia?" Everybody nodded giving Gibbs a look that spelled; 'Isn't it obvious?'

'Like I can forget jumping off an airport window along with a guy that had just threatened to blow that said airport to smithereens…' Tony thought.

"Well the feds arrested the remaining members of the so called 'New Army' and they were sentenced to sixty years imprisonment…" Gibbs said.

"Then what is the problem?" Ziva interrupted.

"The problem is," Gibbs continued even more pissed that he was interrupted "that six of them managed to escape two days ago. According to all sources, they know we are the reason for their arrest. In their minds we interrupted their work to purify the Army. So they decided to kill us and then continue their 'work'" Gibbs concluded.

Everyone fell silent for a second. Tony was the one to snap out of it first. "Wait a second boss." He said. "You said the feds knew about their escape for two days. How comes we didn't find out earlier?" he asked now as pissed off as Gibbs. "We are after all the ones that are immediately interested." He added.

"They thought they could handle the situation without us." Gibbs answered. "Plus they are still pissed that we were the ones that broke the case and not them…"

"So now what boss?" McGee asked.

"Since they know where we work, I have arranged with the director for all of us to be transported in a safe location until they are arrested." And then added with a sigh; "That is all we can do at such short notice. We are leaving right now. We are already two days late." And with that he grabbed his jacket and headed for the exit. The three agents followed him, Tony having that odd feeling once again.

'Something is going to go wrong. I can feel it.' He thought, following Gibbs in the elevator.

Outside the NCIS office building; 4 twenty five in the afternoon;

As the four agents walked outside the office building and headed for the parking lot Tony's bad feeling was only getting worse by the second. For some unknown reason, he felt the urge to look at the rooftop of the building behind the parking lot. For only a second he felt that something really important, even crucial for his life, was situated at the moment at that roof. But he immediately dismissed that thought as a gun shot came from behind one of the parking cars.

"Take cover!" Gibbs ordered.

Tony didn't need a second order he run tacking cover behind a van that was right in frond of him, noticing Gibbs taking down one of the attackers while tacking cover himself.

Unknown to them however, they had audience in their little gunfight. Right on that rooftop where Tony looked only seconds before, two people were watching the turn of events, each waiting for the right time to act and each for a different reason.

Rooftop across the NCIS office building; 4 twenty in the afternoon;

'I've been waiting here for an hour at least' she thought. 'Surely the feds must have informed them by now. What is taking them so long?'

She had actually been situated on the same location for about an hour and thirty two minutes exactly -but who's counting? Anyways it had felt so much longer to her. She knew _he_ was inside that building. And that thought was almost enough to make her run trough the frond doors all the way to his office and kiss him till they both run out of air. But she knew she couldn't and that was killing her. For real this time.

Though she wasn't there she was always watching out for him. Well after she left intensive care that is. 'Nobody takes a shot to the head and is fine the next day I guess.' She thought while rubbing the spot where the bullet had hit her. There really was no scar, since she had it removed three months ago, not wanting to have a permanent reminder of that specific event of her life.

Since she had come back to field action she always kept an eye on him. She saw him turning from the always happy and carefree guy to this perfectly professional and unbelievably reckless man; the kind of man who jumps of windows and rides horses in order to catch the criminals he was after. She always knew that he could be the best agent in his field if he wanted to. 'I just wanted us to be the best team of agents, me and him, as stupid and disgustingly romantic this might sound.' She thought. 'I am so proud of him though. He really did it. And on his own.'

But she had more pressing matters on her mind to keep daydreaming about_ him_. 'Those morons from the 'New Army' are here.' She thought. She silently watched as five of them hid behind some parked cars at the parking lot.

'I guess I am lucky I decided to watch them from up here.' She thought. 'The moment I found out those morons wanted to kill my friends, wanted to kill_ him_, I knew I had to find a place from where I could watch them until they left the office…' But she was unable to continue with her thoughts as she heard someone climbing the stairs to the rooftop. She quickly hid behind a pile of old pipes, that she had no idea how they got there, still able to watch what was happening four stories beneath her and keep an eye on the man who climbed the stairs.

'A sniper.' She thought with fear. She then looked at the agents that were taking cover beneath her. She heard the sniper shoot a warning shot, trying to scare them.

'Stupid action really' she thought as _he_ looked at the sniper's location. 'Now they know he is here, so they are going to be twice as careful' she thought, a bit more relaxed, yet ready to move if she had to.

For the next five minutes she watched, holding her breath as the agents took down their attackers one by one. She would have already taken the sniper down herself, but she had direct orders not to compromise her cover. At least not for the next week, or else it would take even longer for her to be allowed to come back. She simply couldn't risk that; even the thought of spending an extra second away from _him_ would be enough to drive her crazy and she knew it.

Then she saw it; the last of the attackers still standing was approaching McGee, trying to get a clear shot at him. She was ready to scream and warn him, but then she saw something that made her heart stop for something more than a second; _he_ had seen the attacker too and decided to act. _He_ broke his cover and shot the attacker, effectively saving McGee's life. But now _his_ life was in danger.

She decided it was time for her to take action. As the sniper aimed at _him_, she moved carefully behind the still unsuspecting sniper kicking him in the head with all her strength. The result was immediate; the sniper did fire, but missed by four feet from his target since he moved the rifle while falling on the floor unconscious. She handcuffed him, happy she had remembered to wear gloves. 'No fingerprints, no worries' she thought.

She turned to leave, but thought of something in the process; 'I wonder if _he_ will…' She bended over the riffle thinking; 'Please remember. Please do. I love you so much.' Then she turned to leave, whispering to herself; "I love you Tony. I love you with all my heart."

Outside the NCIS office building; 4 thirty five in the afternoon;

To say that Tony was bewildered would be the understatement of the century. He knew he was shot. He had to be.

'What did just happen?' he thought opening his eyes. He saw the same curious look on McGee's, Ziva's and even Gibbs's face.

"What did just happen?" Tony asked out loud this time.

"You should have been shot." Gibbs said, worry clear in his voice. Then however the worry turned to anger as he realized that Tony had once again put his life to danger. "What were you thinking DiNozzo? You could have been killed."

All four of them looked at the rooftop for a couple of seconds and when they realized the sniper was no longer an issue (he could have shot each one of them twice by now) they reached for Tony. McGee reached him first and pooled him once again in a brotherly hug.

"Ugh, I think we have talked about hugging in the past haven't we Probie?" He couldn't resist teasing McGee.

McGee surprisingly muttered something that sounded a lot like; "Shut up Tony". However that didn't preventing from turning tomato red as usual.

Then it was Ziva's turn; she literally hung herself from his neck while saying between sobs; "Why did you do that? You could have been killed!"

Tony, who couldn't thing of anything to say to her, turned to Gibbs and stated; "We should probably go and check what happened on that roof boss."

"You are right DiNozzo" Gibbs said, a bit less angry, realizing Tony had saved McGee's life. He then looked at Ziva, who was still crying, hugging from Tony's neck and said;

"Agent David, you stay here and inform the rest of the agents." he said pointing at the entrance of the office, where the rest NCIS agents started to gather, having heard the shooting. "DiNozzo and McGee, you are coming with me. Let's go see what happened on that rooftop."

Rooftop across the NCIS office building; 4 forty five in the afternoon;

Gibbs was the first one to reach the rooftop with McGee and Tony right behind him. Once he set eyes on the sniper he realized he was unconscious, probably knocked badly to the head. He also realized he was handcuffed. He then took a closer look at the riffle that lay next to the now unconscious sniper.

"What is that on the barrel of the rifle boss?" McGee asked.

"I don't know, McGee." Gibbs answered. "It seems like some kind of…" but he never finished his sentence as he at that moment looked at Tony; he had turned completely white and his gun had slipped from his hands. He seemed to be mesmerized by the rifle and unable to even breathe, let alone move.

"DiNozzo?" he asked, concern in his voice for the second time in less than fifteen minutes. "Are you all right?"

Tony barely heard him though. He felt dizzy and all of the voices around him seemed to become a buzzing blare as all he could hear at the moment was the sound of his own beating heart, hammering inside his chest.

'I must be dreaming' he thought numbly. 'This can't be true. No! It just can't be true. She is dead. No matter how much you hope, you know that it is true.' He tried to convince himself. 'Then what is this? Did the bullet actually hit me? Am I hallucinating?' But he couldn't deny the facts; Gibbs and McGee had seen it too. He heard them talking about it just seconds ago. He had to admit it. Against his logic, against all he knew was true, it was right in frond of his eyes;

A silky red ribbon, tied around the barrel of the weapon, waving slightly in the breeze.


	11. Reunited

Hi, guys! Thank you so much for the reviews, the favs and alerts! You are absolutely amazing! As you might have noticed from the title, Kate comes back in this chapter! I just couldn't wait any longer! She HAD to come back! Keep reviewing and, what's most important, enjoy the story!

**DISCLAIMER;** I, sadly, don't own any of the NCIS characters mentioned in this fic.

**REUNITED**

Tony's apartment; 2nd of February; 11 thirty in the afternoon;

Tony was once again starring at the rain outside his window. Since the incident with the red ribbon, he had entered a zombie like state working more as a robot than ever. The results in his work during the past week were more than stunning; he had even finished his paperwork before McGee. His ability to socialize however had gone out of the window. All he could thing about was Kate.

'Could she be alive?' he thought. 'But I was there when she died. For the love of God her blood was all over my face!' thinking about that he kicked the coffee table with all of his strength, effectively turning it upside down. He then sighed and proceeded putting it in its right place; in frond of the couch, legs down. He had tried not to trash his house completely and he had done pretty well.

'Thankfully, humans have invented boxing' he thought, sighing and throwing himself on his couch. He replayed the last week in his mind once again.

Once they had found the sniper, and the ribbon off course, it had taken Tony about five minutes to compose himself. On the outside at least, because on the inside he was still an emotional mess. He had tried to make some sense out of the situation. At first he had asked Abby whether the sniper himself had tied the ribbon on the rifle.

'I should have expected it was a long shot' he thought as he remembered what Abby had told him;

"_I have already run the ribbon for prints, Tony. And I am afraid there are no prints whatsoever on it. That leads me to believe that it was placed on the rifle by whoever_ _left the sniper unconscious. It seems to be just a simple red ribbon made of silk. What do you think the ribbon means anyway?"_ She had asked. Off course Tony didn't answer. What could he possibly tell her?

'Oh, nothing. Don't worry Abbs. I am just suspecting that Kate is sending me messages from the grave… Nothing to worry about!' he thought bitterly. 'Yeah, that would have gone really well!'

'Not to mention that the sniper had never laid eyes on his attacker.' He added angrily. 'Gibbs interrogated him for seven hours. Nobody lies to Gibbs that long. Plus he let me have a go with him…' he thought as he remembered the interrogation process. 'I was really pissed at that moment' he admitted to himself. 'By the end of the interrogation I even felt sorry for the guy. Even Gibbs was surprised by the outcome. He had never seen a psychopath felon braking to tears in the interrogation room I guess… Maybe I was a bit too harsh on him.' Tony thought. 'He did however confess all of the attacks of the 'New Army' and even mentioned their associates. At least something good came from this parody…'

And only to make things worse, Tony had found another red ribbon tied on his doorknob that night once he returned from the office. He was holding it in his hands right now. And it was killing him. At the spur of the moment he brought the ribbon closer to his face…

'Impossible' he thought, staring at the ribbon intensively like it was about to talk and give him all the answers he needed. As soon as he had brought it closer to his face and took in a breath, he inhaled Kate's scent, emanating from the ribbon. He took another breath of the heavenly scent coming from the ribbon. 'Definitely Kate's scent' he thought. He would recognize her scent anywhere; it was a mix of her perfume, her shampoo -that held an almost painful resemblance to the scent of fresh picked roses- and something he could only describe as well… Kate.

He held the ribbon near his heart, closing his eyes and letting his mind wonder. He remembered her smile, their stupid little arguments and the amazing sensation of freedom he had when he was with her. He always felt he could be himself near her and that is probably the reason why he was so joyful around her.

He no longer cared where the ribbon had come from. He felt closer to Kate than he had felt for the past six months and that was enough for him.

He was however brought back to reality from the ringing of his doorbell. He tried to ignore it and return to his perfect little dream, where Kate was still alive, but he just couldn't. He actually let out something that sounded like a growl and, taking the ribbon with him, headed for the door, feeling murderous and wondering who could possible knock his door at midnight.

Outside Tony's apartment; 11 fifty in the afternoon;

Kate had been waiting for Tony to come back from work so that she could finally talk to him. Once she found out that he had recognized the first ribbon she couldn't resist to leave yet another one. So, after he left for work that morning, she had entered the apartment building and tied the ribbon around the doorknob. 'It isn't here now' she noticed 'so he must have found it.' She knew he had come back home since she had heard a noise like something had crashed on the floor a few minutes ago.

Everything was finally settled. She had the clearance to return to NCIS as an active agent first thing tomorrow. She would inform director Shepard and show her all the necessary documents provided to her by the CIA, proving what she had been doing for the past five months and she would be able to return to active duty the same day. But she wanted to talk to Tony first. She had to.

'I just can't go back unless I find out what he feels about me. I mean I know **I** love him. I loved him since I first laid eyes on him, even if he was too absorbed with all the other females in the planet to notice me.' She thought. 'I hoped he would have gotten the hint when I stayed with him during the pneumonic plague incident, risking my own life just to be near him, just because I couldn't leave me alone.' She shuddered while remembering the thoughts that had passed through her mind back then. She had thought that he would die before she could tell him what she felt about him.

'I never thought I would 'die' before telling him though.' She took another sigh and looked at the door once again. She had been thinking about that moment for the past four months since she had awakened from her shot inflicted coma. 'So why is it so difficult to ring the doorbell?' She let out a sigh. She knew exactly what her problem was.

'I am afraid that he doesn't love me.' She admitted to herself. She dreaded the possibility that he wouldn't want her back into his life. She couldn't even think what she would do if that was the true. 'No!' She ordered herself. 'You are here after all this time. You are not going back. Ring the doorbell.' She ordered herself.

She put her finger near the button ready to push it. She took in a deep breath and thought of Tony. She imagined his face and his contagious laughter. And that was all it took for her to find her courage. She would talk to Tony again. And that was a reason good enough for her to do anything in the world, let alone ring a stupid little doorbell.

She took another deep breath and rung the doorbell. In the beginning nothing happened and she wondered if he had fallen asleep. She then heard something that resembled a growl coming from inside the apartment and afterwards footsteps coming closer and closer to the door.

'This is it.' She thought and looked straight at the door, the only thing between her and the love of her life.

Tony's apartment; midnight;

Tony reached for the doorknob and opened the door. He was ready for a severe argument with whoever had stopped his amazing daydreaming only a few seconds ago.

'I might as well as kill whoever rung the doorbell.' He thought. 'This was the happiest moment of my day, if not of the last month…' But as he saw who was standing outside his door, all the thoughts of revenge disappeared from his mind. He forgot where he was, he forgot why he was there and -if he wanted to be true to himself- he even forgot how to breathe for a second or two.

"Hi Tony" Kate said with a small smile on her lips, but with eyes that betrayed her anxiety.

'Am I dreaming again?' Tony thought. 'No, don't be stupid!' He answered his own question. 'You remember hearing the doorbell and walking towards the door. Your right leg is still a little soar from when you kicked the coffee table.' He took another look at Kate. He had to admit she looked better than ever. Her hair was longer, almost reaching the middle of her waist. They were still the same dark brown color he loved so much. Her eyes were still the amazing dark depths that mesmerized him every time. And she was smiling one of her perfect smiles again. She wore tight black jeans and a soft woolen pullover with a black belt on it. It looked amazing on her, especially with the contrast of the white pullover and her dark hair that were cascading at her back.

'No, this isn't a dream.' Tony thought. 'That must mean that I have gone crazy… well it was about time…'

Kate, who was at the moment oblivious of his inner fight with his madness, parted her lips to talk, only to be stopped by Tony. He seemed to have awakened from his trance, as he had moved faster than she had ever seen him move in the past. He closed the distance between them in a fraction of a second, wrapped his arms protectively around Kate's waist and kissed her as his life -or his sanity- depended on it.

'Since I've gone crazy' Tony thought 'and since this hallucination looks so real, I might as well enjoy it before they lock me up.'

'So much for not wanting me back in his life.' Kate thought, almost bursting with happiness, as she started kissing him back.

'Damn!' Tony thought. 'This hallucination not only looks, but feels real too.' And then it hit him; This had to be real. In all of his dreams (and he should know, he had more than one every day) he could see Kate, listen to her voice and sometimes even talk to her.

'But this is just so real!' He thought while tracing her back with his hands. 'I shouldn't be able to hold her like this. I shouldn't be able to feel her touch. And damn! I shouldn't be able to kiss her like that!'

He held her tighter and asked permission to deepen their kiss, biting her bottom lip as softly as he could manage. Kate was more than eager to comply, so she allowed him entrance.

'She even tastes amazing.' Tony thought. 'O.k. I admit it! I've lost it! This is far too good to be true! Wait a second…' his thoughts had led him to a rather weird conclusion. 'What if she is not alive? What if I am dead? What if the sniper actually hit me, I fell into a coma and now I'm dead?' But this bizarre train of thoughts was abruptly brought to an end, as Kate let out a moan she had been holding in for far too long.

'The hell with it!' Tony thought, shaking his shoulders in a sign of defeat. 'If I am dead, then this is heaven and I shouldn't complain about it…'

Kate however, felt the movement of his shoulders and realized for the first time how confused Tony should feel at the moment. So she let out another moan and broke their kiss, trying to ignore the physical pain this simple action had caused her.

"Tony" she whispered, placing two of her fingers softly on his lips to prevent him from kissing her again. 'I have to stay focused to explain what happened during the past months to him and kissing isn't the best way to focus. If he kisses me again,' she thought 'talking will be the only thing we won't be doing tonight…'

She let out a sigh, smiling a bit seeing his confused and pained expression as she prevented him from kissing her again.

"Tony" she said again, this time her voice something more than a whisper. "As much as I want to do this, I have to explain what happened. Please listen to me…"


	12. Surprise!

Hi everybody! Sorry for taking so long to update. Honestly not my fault. Who said Law is an easy subject to study? Not me! Thanks for all the reviews! You have no idea what they mean to me! This chapter is going to be about the reactions of the NCIS agents (including Ziva) to Kate's return and Tony's and Kate's relationship. And I am really planning to make it long and fluffy. The explanation of where she had been will also be included here… By the way, this is not going to be the last chapter of this fic. I'm planning to write about a case which Tony and Kate are going to solve together. With no more delay, on with the story!

**DISCLAIMER;** I, sadly, don't own any of the NCIS characters mentioned in this fic.

**SURPRISE!**

NCIS office building; 7 in the morning;

Tony was as happy as he could be. He was at the moment looking at Kate's desk. It was empty, but he wasn't worried. He knew that Kate was at director Shepard's office explaining what had happened and why she wasn't dead.

'I had some trouble believing it myself' He admitted to himself. In a way he still wasn't sure this was not some crazy dream from which he was going to abruptly wake up. He shook his head with dismay at his own thoughts. 'Now Tony, don't be stupid.' He scolded himself. 'You know this is real so stop messing it up!'

He could still remember vividly the events from last night…

Tony's apartment; 1 thirty in the morning;

Tony was sitting on his couch, looking -staring actually- at the person right across the room; Kate. His Kate.

"And that's when they told me it would be safe to come back…" Kate finished her explanation. "I was however watching over you, you know…" She said, assuming a half scared and half proud look. "You jumped of a window! Do you have any idea what that did to me? I thought I lost you for good! And all those reckless things you did!" she stopped to take a look at Tony and take a breath, since she was rapidly running out of air. Tony had a completely unreadable expression on his face, but she continued nonetheless; "Chasing a lunatic while on horseback, honestly Tony, what were you thinking!" She exclaimed, looking at him like he had gone crazy.

"I mean it's not that I didn't feel unbelievably proud of you, but you could have been…" She never got to finish her sentence as she felt Tony's arms wrapping around her waist and his lips crushing onto hers.

'How did he make it across the room so fast?' She thought to herself, only to quickly dismiss the thought, to actually dismiss any thought, her fear and anger long gone, as all that mattered to her at the moment was Tony.

"Did you actually feel proud about me?" he whispered on her lips between their kisses. Kate, who had at the moment lost her ability to speak, nodded yes, as she felt Tony's arms wrap tighter around her an lifting her from the couch where she was sitting only seconds ago.

"That was the main point you know…" he answered, chuckling a bit to himself, as he carried her effortlessly to the upper floor. "I always hoped that you were somehow able to see me, so I decided to do my best and make you proud of me." His voice sounded husky as he pushed his bedroom door open.

"Well, I have news for you; it worked." Kate answered almost out of breath, as Tony carefully placed both of them on his bed.

"You know Kate," he said looking straight into her eyes, leaving Kate breathless once again with the intensity of his stare; "I am so glad it did work." And with that he leaned to kiss her once again…

Tony's apartment; 5 thirty in the morning;

Tony was at the moment staring at Kate's sleeping form next to him. Her head was placed on his chest as she held him tight in her arms. He gently stroke her hair away from her face, so that he could see more of her gorgeous features he had missed so badly. She slowly opened her eyes.

"I'm really sorry baby." Tony apologized, looking at her adoringly. "I didn't mean to wake you up."

"It's o.k." Kate said, stretching her hands, unknowingly sending jolts of joy all over Tony's body. "I had to wake up anyways. Big day at work today…" She sounded a bit nervous, so Tony cupped her cheeks tenderly with his hands and raised her face so she could look in his eyes.

"It will be perfectly fine." He reassured her. "I will be there." He kissed her nose, making her giggle and whisper a playful; "You missed."

He then kissed her lips. "Better?" He asked. He saw her nodding 'yes', smiling at him. "You know I love you, right?" He asked, holding her tighter to his chest.

"And I love you. More than you'll ever know." She simply stated.

"You know, I was thinking about returning to work today…" Tony said suddenly looking mischievous.

"Why do you have the look you get when you are just about to tease Probie?" Kate asked, trying not to look as mischievous as she herself felt. 'Tony always has that effect on me.' She thought.

"Hey! You called Probie Probie!" Tony exclaimed, sounding more like an excited ten year old than a trained NCIS agent that stopped terrorists for living.

Kate couldn't help but laugh at his reaction. "Yes I did." She admitted. "And I think it's your fault. You're brainwashing me!" she mock accused him.

"And for that I will be eternally proud!" He answered. "Now, do you want to know what I was thinking?"

"You know I do." She answered, winking playfully. He chuckled and started explaining the plan he had come up with. After he finished explaining, he saw Kate looking at him, one eyebrow perfectly arched.

"That is plain evil Tony" she said looking thoughtful at him. Then an evil grin spread to her face and her eyes gleamed playfully. "But I do like the way you're thinking. And since I'm coming back, I might as well do it in a way they will never forget."

Tony brought her to his chest once again and as she started tracing circles on it with her fingertips, a sly grin matching hers appeared on his face. "So, how exactly do you want to do it?" he asked.

NCIS office building; 7 thirty in the morning;

Tony saw Kate coming from director Shepard's office. The director herself didn't make an appearance. 'I guess a supposedly deceased employee coming back from the dead asking her job back, is bound to make some impact…'

"Hi gorgeous." He greeted Kate happily.

"Hi handsome." She greeted him back, making her way to his desk and kissing him softly on the lips. He put his arms around her and asked;

"How did the director take it?"

"Pretty well, I guess. Off course she had already been informed by CIA, so I guess it was easier for her to accept the facts." She said, striking some of Tony's disheveled hair away from his eyes. She then smiled happily. "I wonder how the others will take it…"

"We are about to find out." Tony said. "Probie and Ziva are bound to arrive any moment now." She bent to kiss him once again and then winked at him cheekily as she walked to her desk.

'God I love that woman!' Tony admitted to himself. He heard the elevator's doors opening and then saw McGee and Abby heading their way. He looked at Kate and grinned at her playful look. They had decided to pretend Kate had never been shot or left the office and wait to see who of their colleagues would snap first. Tony betted on McGee. As they approached Tony heard them talking about last week's assault. Once they reached Tony's office McGee turned to greet him. His greetings however never made it to Tony's ears as he heard Abby gasp. He quickly turned to look at whatever had scared her, only to feel his mouth drop due to his shock.

"Kate…" Abby whispered. Kate looked at her with innocent eyes and fake surprise.

'Damn! She can be an amazing actress if she wants to.' Tony thought, feeling his chest swelling with pride.

"Kate!" Abby shrieked this time, running to Kate's office and launching onto her, almost hugging her to death. McGee quickly followed suit, grinning like a maniac. Kate rose up, breaking free from Abby's chokehold, and headed to Tony who was now standing in frond of his desk, pretending to be confused.

"What's gotten into you?" she asked McGee and Abby, who now looked beyond shocked. "We see each other everyday and yet you are acting like we haven't met in months!"

'She is good!' Tony thought, looking at a dumbfounded McGee and a really confused Abby.

"B-But you're dead!" McGee blurted out. Tony thought it was the right time to step in the conversation.

"Uhm… have you two been drinking?" He asked looking as confused and innocent as he could. "What do you mean 'dead' anyways Probie?" he continued, looking at McGee like he had gone crazy.

"But you were shot! At the head! Ari killed you!" McGee exclaimed. Abby just stared at Kate and nodded vividly affirmative to whatever McGee was saying. Kate turned to Tony and said;

"I think you are right baby." They had decided they wouldn't keep their relationship a secret. Gibbs would just have to deal with it. "They have definitely been drinking." She then turned to Abby and McGee and said in a matter-of-fact tone; "Ari didn't like me, we all know that. Heck! He hated me and so did I! But he has been dead for six months. How could he shoot me?"

The two of them turned to Tony, looking desperate, but he just said; "She is right you know. And I would really appreciate it if you didn't scare my girlfriend…" And in order to appear more convincing (and because he couldn't resist any longer) he put an arm around Kate and peck-kissed her on the lips. She smiled at him happily, thinking; 'I've waited so long for him to call me his girlfriend. Finally!'

Abby and McGee no longer knew what to say. They just stared at the two of them, each one lost in their own thoughts.

'But I know she is dead! How can she be alive and Tony's girlfriend on top of it all?' McGee thought.

'Oh my God! Oh my God! Kate is alive! Kate is alive? And she is kissing with Tony? I must be daydreaming… And what do they mean she was never dead? I must be loosing it!' Abby thought.

Then the four of them heard Gibbs's voice coming from behind them. "McGee and DiNozzo, once David gets here I want you to…" his sentence remained unfinished as he saw Kate, who was looking calmly at him.

'This is going to be really interesting.' Tony and Kate thought at the same time.

"Right on time, boss." Tony told a clearly shocked Gibbs. 'Truthfully, a rare sight.' Tony thought as he continued; "I think Abby and Probie are losing it."

'No they are not.' Gibbs thought, still unable to form a coherent sentence. 'If somebody is going crazy, that's me! I thought I saw Kate. Damn! I can still see her. This can't be a good sign for my mental health…'

"Yeah Gibbs." Kate said. "They've been trying to convince Tony and me that I am dead. I must admit it has started to get uncomfortable."

"But you are dead Kate…" Gibbs managed to whisper.

"Not you too boss!" Tony exclaimed.

"What is it with you people?" Kate asked, trying to hide her amusement. "Is today annoy-Kate-day or something?"

Tony could barely hold his laughter anymore. He was about to start chuckling when he saw Ziva approaching them. 'That should be fun to watch.' He thought. 'Ziva is the only member of the team that has never actually laid eyes on Kate. Good thing Kate knows who she is. This is bound to confuse everyone even more, if that's possible.'

"Hey, Ziva!" Kate exclaimed, like she had known Ziva for years. "Please be the voice of reason and tell these people that I am not dead!"

Ziva frowned as she looked at Kate. "Well," she said "I don't know who you are but I can assure every one that you are not dead." She then turned to Abby, McGee and Gibbs, who still hadn't said anything and asked them; "Why are you telling her she is dead?" She then noticed Tony's arm that was still wrapped around Kate and added angrily; "And who are you anyways?"

"Well sweetheart," Tony said looking at Kate "at least she agrees that you aren't dead…"

"Yeah," Kate answered "but she says she doesn't know me" She then crossed her arms and looked at Ziva. "To refresh your memory, I am agent Caitlyn Todd, I've been working for NCIS for about two years and a half and you are at the moment placing your purse and jacket on my desk!" Kate said, watching Ziva's movements.

"You can't be agent Todd. Ari killed agent Todd six months ago. And this has been my desk for almost five months now! And why is Tony calling you 'sweetheart'?" Ziva almost yelled the last question at Kate.

"I… I just can't take this!" McGee exclaimed and landed on the floor, pulling his knees to his chest.

"Yes!" Tony exclaimed raising his fist. "I knew Probie would be the first one to break down." He then turned to Kate and said; "Baby you owe me ten bucks…"

"You can be such a child sometimes." Kate mock scolded Tony, before breaking into laughter, with Tony quickly following her example. While they were laughing their colleagues just stared at them (McGee still on the floor) until Gibbs found the strength to talk.

"What is the meaning of all this?" He asked trying to sound scary and angry. He sounded more like confused and awestricken, but at least he managed to stop their laughing.

"O.k. …" Kate started "I admit it! I was shot six months ago, but as you can see, I didn't die." Still there was no response from the rest of the agents, since even Gibbs had now fallen to his previous confused state.

"Baby, I think you should tell them exactly what happened." Tony told her.

"I guess I should start from the beginning then." Kate stated. "As you can all remember, I was shot to the head six months ago by Ari." Everybody nodded numbly 'yes'. Kate looked at Tony who nodded encouragingly, so she continued; "Everybody thought I died. Heck, for a moment even I thought I died! What you don't know is that after I was shot and brought back here, Ducky found out that I still had a pulse. It was weak but still it was there. Later, when I woke from a two months long comma, I was told that the bullet wound was not through and through. The bullet was stuck in a way that prevented me from bleeding to death. Ducky wanted to inform you guys when the CIA come along. They have been targeting Ari and his associates for about a year and actually had planned to stage my death -due to Ari's fascination towards me- and change my body with another, specially prepared to look like mine. Once they found out I was shot, they sent some agents to see what had happened for themselves. Once Ducky told them I was alive they proceeded to the body exchange, making sure Ducky wouldn't tell you anything. In their original plan, you would have been informed, but since I got shot, they thought it would look more natural if you actually thought I was dead. After I woke from the comma the CIA asked me to help them with their investigation for the rest of Ari's connections in the country. I was too valuable to their investigation to let me tell you I was alive. So I waited for the investigation to be over, so I could return…" She took in a deep breath and added;

"I was never far away though. Last week I helped you guys with that sniper."

"And for that I will be eternally grateful." Tony said, pulling her in for a hug, a huge grin on his face. He had heard the same explanation last night, so he knew how the other agents where feeling right now. He and Kate both turned to face them. Gibbs, Abby and Ziva looked lost and confused. McGee shared their feelings, still sitting on the floor. Gibbs was once again the one to speak first.

"So Ducky knew?" he asked.

Kate got ready to answer as Tony chuckled lightly at the question. 'Kate just told his she was a part of a CIA conspiracy for the last six months and all he can come up with is 'Ducky knew?'?' He thought.

"Yeah he did" Kate answered "but he couldn't tell you. I haven't yet managed to convince him to tell me what the CIA used to convince him to stay silent, but it sure worked!"

Then Tony remembered a conversation he had with Ducky three moths ago. "He did however try to give me some hints, but I guess I was far too depressed to work out their meaning." He admitted.

"How comes you are taking this so lightly?" Abby asked, bewilderment in her voice.

"Lightly?" Tony asked "I'm not taking this lightly! But I found out she was alive last night, so I guess I had a bit more time to process all that information than you guys did." He admitted.

"Last night?" Gibbs asked. Then he remembered how Tony had called Kate, so he repeated Ziva's earlier question; "Why are you calling her 'sweetheart'?"

"Well that is something I've been meaning to tell you." Tony said, tightening his grip around Kate's shoulder. "I'm in love with her boss. Yeah, I know!" He said as he saw that McGee, Gibbs and Abby were looking at him as he had just grown a second head and Ziva was shooting death glares to Kate. "Shocking! Me in love, who would have thought? Anyways, I just found out she feels the same about me and, honestly boss, after thinking she was dead for six months, I have no intention of letting her go ever again. If you don't agree, that's fine, just don't expect that your opinion will change anything this time." Tony said decisively. Kate gave him one of his favorite smiles and his heart skipped a beat. Then they both looked at Gibbs. His face was expressionless.

"It's not like I hadn't seen it coming." Gibbs admitted. "I guess I could overlook rule number twelve for once." He added. It was Kate's and Tony's turn to look astonished.

"You mean it Gibbs?" Kate asked.

"Well, it's not like my agents come back from the dead every day." He shrugged and then added; "I guess the conditions are a bit different this time." He then noticed the bewildered looks everybody was giving him and said; "I, off course, expect you to be perfectly professional while at work. If you are still working here Kate."

"I'll be working here, be sure of it." Kate said excited. "I have already talked to director Shepard. I can start working right now, if you want Gibbs!"

"And don't worry boss. We will be professional!" Tony reassured Gibbs and pulled Kate in for a kiss.

"I think I said professional DiNozzo!" Gibbs said trying to sound serious. But he was too overjoyed, not only to have Kate back, but to also have Tony snap out from his zombie like state, so he sounded exactly as he felt; overjoyed.

Abby broke from her trance and once again ran over to Kate, pulling her in another bone crushing hug. McGee finally rose from the floor and went to hug Kate as well. Surprisingly, so did Gibbs, even if he was more restrained than Abby.

"You really had me there for a moment!" Abby admitted between tears.

"Me too…" McGee said.

"Sorry about that guys." Kate apologized. "I think Tony is affecting me. I just couldn't resist teasing you a little. I didn't have a reason to laugh for quite some time."

"It's all right Kate!" Abby said. "Just don't do that again. Or if you do, tell me and I'll help!" She offered happily.

"Well if you are going to work here," Ziva said frostily, earning a glare from everyone "you might need to get a new desk, because I'm not giving you mine."

"Technically, it's Kate's desk" Gibbs said sternly and Tony mentally applauded his words.

"No, it's o.k." Kate said.

"What?" Tony asked shocked. 'I thought she liked working close to me. And I don't have any intention to let her from my sight for more than it takes to blink my eyes.'

He thought.

Kate understood what Tony was thinking, so she said; "Let me finish my sentence Tony." She said. "I said it's o.k. for her to use my desk, until she finds a new one. I can always share your desk anyways, can't I baby?"

Tony was thrilled; "Share mine?" he asked. Kate realized how happy he was, so she decided to tease him a bit.

"Well baby, it's o.k. if you don't want to. I can always share Tim's…" she never finished his sentence though, as Tony exclaimed;

"Don't even think about that!" Saying that, he pulled her in his arms and lifted her from the floor like she weighted less than a feather. He then placed her on the edge of his desk and ordered; "Don't you move from here. I'm going to bring you a chair…" And with that he turned to do what he said, not caring one bit about the chuckles coming from his colleagues or a new row of death glares from Ziva.

'You are back now Kate' He thought to himself as he heard her musical laughter 'and I'm not letting you get away ever again…'


	13. Murder In Pieces

Hi everybody! Thank you so much for the reviews! I am thrilled you like this story! I am so sorry for the late update… No worries however! Exams will be over this week so I will be able to update much more regularly. I promise! In the meantime, here is the next chapter with more Tate action. Enjoy the story and don't forget; keep reviewing!

**DISCLAIMER;** I, sadly, don't own any of the NCIS characters mentioned in this fic.

**MURDER IN PIECES**

Tony's apartment; 9 thirty in the afternoon;

Tony was sitting on his couch pretending to be reading the file of their recent case. What he was really doing, was watching Kate making them dinner. 'I can't believe she can look so perfect even while cooking.' He thought. Kate was at the moment walking to where he was sitting. She approached the couch and sat on his lap.

"Well, lunch will be ready in half an hour." Kate said. "We should better take a look at the case. Tomorrow will be my official first day back at work and we are already working on our first case since I returned. I hope I still got it." She admitted sounding a bit nervous.

"Off course you still got it!" Tony said reassuring her. He cupped her face with his hands and kissed her. "You have nothing to worry about" he said and kissed a now smiling Kate again. "You are the best NCIS agent I have ever known" he added, kissing her for the third time. "Oh, by the way, I really like what you said about the case…" Kate looked at him confused.

"What exactly do you like about a case that includes severed body parts being sent to the victims' relatives?" Kate asked and then added "And I don't remember saying anything about the case."

"If I am not mistaken you said it was 'our' case." Tony said winking playfully at Kate.

"I did, although I believe you are the only one that could ever find something romantic in a case about body parts…" Kate said teasing him.

"I find everything that has to do with you romantic." Tony admitted. 'And I don't even think I have ever said the word 'romantic' aloud before.' He thought.

"Let's see if you are going to think the same if I stay with you for a week or so." Kate said.

"A week?" Tony asked. 'Is she planning to leave again?' He thought, feeling dread spreading in his heart. "I thought you were going to stay here for good." He whispered so softly, Kate almost failed to hear him.

"I am staying for good." Kate said. "I meant until I find my own apartment." She explained.

Tony looked at her seriously and took her hands in his. "Kate I've been meaning to talk to you about this." Tony said. "I know that this is all new for us, I mean being together and all, but we know each other for years and I… well I would really like it if you would stay here with me…" He looked at Kate. She seemed to be shocked. 'Damn I hope I didn't take this too fast' he thought and quickly added; "Off course you don't have to stay if you don't want you. I don't want to rush things. And if you stay you can have you own room. You don't…" That's how far he managed to go as Kate's lips didn't allow him to continue.

"I would love to stay here with you!" She said, making Tony grin like a maniac. "And I would love sharing your room even more…" It was Tony's turn to kiss her.

"So, does that mean we will have 'our' room?" Tony asked between kisses.

"Yes, it does…" Kate said "You really enjoy saying the word 'our', right?" She asked.

"It usually freaks me out, but when it comes to you, yes, I do enjoy saying it." He admitted.

"Well how about we take a look at 'our' case. I am really getting nervous about it, plus I promised Gibbs that I wouldn't keep you too occupied to be unable to do your work…" Kate said.

"In that case, let's take a look at it." Tony said winking again. His spirits were lifted since Kate had returned and it had started to show. "According to this file," Tony began "a Mrs. Christina Harris received a box, wrapped like a gift, which contained a right hand, later confirmed to belong to marine officer Martin Harris, Mrs. Harris's husband. The hand appeared to be cut off post mortem. Later the rest of his body was found at an empty lot, shot twice in the chest, two blocks away from their house."

"And three days later," Kate continued "a Mrs. Ashley Davis found an identical box containing another right hand, later confirmed to be her daughter's, marine officer Marie Davis, hand. Lack of bleeding in the wound also suggests it was severed post mortem. Officer Davis's body was found dumped in a park near her house. No indicators of sexual assault or theft also shot twice in the chest."

"Is there any connection between the two victims?" Tony asked.

"As far as I can see, no" Kate said "but I'll have to get a better look at the case before I can answer that question for sure."

"So first thing we have to check, is that exactly." Tony said and looked at Kate mischievously.

"Can you access the army data base from here?" Kate asked smiling back, understanding what Tony's look suggested; bending the rules.

"Have I ever mentioned that I like the way you're thinking?" Tony asked.

"No, at least not today." Kate said.

"Well, in that case I should better mention that I like the way you're thinking…" Tony said making Kate giggle.

"You go check the data base and I'll meet you in seconds." Kate said.

"Where are you going?" Tony asked.

"If you don't want 'our' lunch to end up as charcoal, I should probably go to the kitchen…" Kate said laughing.

"Oh, right… lunch. O.k. I'll be waiting for you." Tony said as he headed towards the computer. All he could think of however had nothing to do with the case; 'She is going to stay here with me. In my house! Correction 'our' house… I have to be the luckiest guy on the planet!' He turned on the computer and entered the military data base, waiting for Kate to arrive. 'Focus DiNozzo!' He ordered himself. 'You have a case to solve, remember? Severed body parts? Plus, you have to impress the lady…'

Kate entered the room a few minutes later, carrying two plates and two glasses. Tony helped her with the rest and soon they were in front of the computer eating and talking about the case.

"You know Kate," Tony said "I haven't eaten a decent meal in ages."

"Glad to be of service." Kate said smiling happily. She then turned her look at the screens. "So the two victims seem to have been emotionally involved." Kate stated.

"Yes, they were. Unbelievable what you can find in that data base. They seem to be heading out of town together and staying at the same hotel, making the navy pay for their, let's say 'vacation' " Tony said.

"That would be a reason good enough for Officer Harris' wife to kill them." Kate said "But then again, why…"

"Why sending her husband's hand to herself inside a box and then do the same with Officer Davis' mother?" Tony finished her sentence.

"Exactly!" Kate said. "Plus, murder is a bit extreme, don't you think? Why kill her husband while she could divorce him?" she asked.

"Got me there." Tony admitted.

"Wait a second." Kate said raising one eyebrow. 'She looks so amazing when she does that…' Tony thought looking at Kate.

"Tony, can you check and see if Mrs. Harris had signed a premarital contract?" Kate asked.

"Let me see… baby you are a genius!" Tony exclaimed making Kate blush. 'And she is even more amazing when she blushes… Bad, bad Tony! Focus on the case!' Tony thought to himself. "They had signed a contract. It seems Officer Harris had inherited quite a large sum of money from his parents. If they got divorced, his wife got nothing. However, if he died, she would inherit everything, including his life insurance."

"So she is now rich." Kate said. "Still it makes no sense. She kills her husband, cuts his hand off and mails it to herself, then kills his affair and sends her hand to her mother."

"I know…" Tony said. "Let me check something for a sec…" He added and started typing at his computer.

"Are you checking Officer Harris' phone records?" Kate asked.

"Yes and I think I found something; there was a call made from his cell to Officer Davis the day after he died. I would like to know how he did it…" He said teasingly.

"I see your point." Kate said smiling. "I guess whoever killed Officer Harris used his cell to call Marie Davis and lure her to him or her." She guessed.

"Was the cell recovered?" Tony asked.

"No." Kate said looking at the case file. "Can you locate it from here?"

"As long as it's turned on." Tony said. "Nope, whoever has it turned it off. I will need to contact the phone company to turn it on and I am afraid this will happen tomorrow."

"So what now?" Kate asked.

"Well it has been along day." Tony said. "I suggest we head to bed."

"Maybe you are right." Kate said, shrugging. "Maybe we should sleep. We have work to do tomorrow."

Tony rose from his chair and lifted Kate to his arms, making her gasp. "Who said anything about sleeping?" He said, leading a laughing Kate to their bedroom.

NCIS office building; 7 in the morning;

Kate and Tony were the first of the agents to reach the office. They both sat at Tony's desk since Ziva hadn't yet found a new one. Tony turned on the computer and Kate picked the phone. They had come up with a plan as to how to find the killer that morning. 'Who said morning shower can't help solving murder cases?' Tony asked himself as images from that morning and last night played in his mind. He tried to focus and turned his attention back to his computer screen while listening to Kate speaking on the phone.

"So you are sure? And when did this happen? I see… Yes, you really helped sir. Thank you." Kate hung up the phone and turned to Tony. "It seems you were right Tony." She said.

"Was there any doubt?" Tony asked, earning a playful punch on the shoulder by Kate. "Ouch! You know that hurt Kate!" He exclaimed.

"Really?" Kate asked grinning.

"Well it sure hurt my feelings… and it would help if you weren't so happy about it." Tony answered giving her a puppy dog look. Kate sighed and murmured something Tony didn't completely understood, but had something to do with him being 'damn sweet' and 'a crybaby'. However Kate was smiling as she asked;  
"Any luck with the cell?"

"As a matter of fact yes." Tony said. "I reached the phone company and after sending them an e-mail signed by our director…"

"Signed by our director?" Kate asked trying to suppress her laughter. "I wonder what will happen if she finds out…"

"Somebody has to tell her in order for her to find out." Tony said. "You are not going to turn me in, are you?" he asked giving her the puppy dog eyes once again. Kate rolled her eyes and muttered something like 'he has to stop doing this' and 'Kate concentrate', before saying; "No, I am not turning you in. What did they say?"

"They are glad to help us with our case. They are reactivating the cell phone right now. It will take them about twenty minutes." Tony explained.

"Then we have time to take a better look at Mrs. Harris's personal life." Kate said smiling.

"Hey! I know that look. What are you up to?" Tony asked.

"Mrs. Harris's lawyer is about to call her office and ask some questions to her employer." Kate said. Tony laughed as he handled the phone to her.

"You can be evil sometimes if you want to…" he said.

"I learned from the best!" Kate said and winked at a smiling Tony. Tony just looked at her while the phone rang.

"Hello, are you Mr. Foster?" Kate asked, ignoring Tony's surprised look. 'Did she just fake a southern accent?' he thought to him self.

"My name is Alice Brown." Kate said looking up Mrs. Harris lawyer's name from her notes. "I am Mrs. Harris's lawyer." She said. "No, she is fine don't worry; I am just calling you to verify some details concerning her husband's life insurance. You know how insurance companies are… let me see now; Mrs. Harris has told me she has been working for you for about…" she nodded to Tony who got the hint and displayed Harris's personal information on the computer. "…for about five years." Kate said, smiling at Tony, silently thanking him for his quick reaction. Tony smiled back and listened to the rest of the conversation.

"I am about to ask you some personal questions about her." Kate said. "You see the amount of the insurance is quite large and the insurance company wants to be thorough. I understand that Mrs. Harris was married for four years. Have you ever noticed anything that might show she was having an affair?" Kate asked. Tony knew where she was heading. They had found out that Christina Harris had an alibi for her husband's murder; helping with charities in a local group she was part of. She didn't have alibi for the second murder however. It also seemed that, according to neighbors, while her husband was away she was seeing another man, whose description portrayed her employer, Ross Foster. 'They were one happy couple, I guess.' Tony thought sarcastically as he watched Kate talking to Foster.

"Yes, they are trying to prove infidelity as a reason for her to murder her husband. You know; anything so they wouldn't pay the insurance…" Kate said smiling. "Off course I understand you don't know… There is no need to shout sir." She stopped talking and looked at the phone. Foster had hanged up on her. "I believe that must have shaken him enough." She said grinning evilly. "Are you tracing his phone calls?" she asked Tony.

"He is calling Christina Harris right now." He said. "By the way, you are an amazing actress." He added. Kate laughed and thanked him.

"Now all we have to do is find were this cell is and we might have our case solved." She said looking at Tony. He pulled her from her chair to his and kissed her.

"You said 'our' case again." He said smiling happily.

"You are getting obsessive, do you know that?" Kate said appearing not to care if he was getting obsessive at all. She kissed him back and then heard someone clearing his throat behind them.

"Hem, hem." They both turned towards the source of that sound and met Ziva's glare from the office across the room. "I thought Gibbs said you had to be professional!" she said angrily, looking at Kate like she could kill her on the spot.

'What is her problem?' Kate thought as Tony was thinking; 'This might turn out to be annoying.'

"If you haven't noticed we have a case to solve, yes?" Ziva asked, still looking murderously at Kate.

"We are working on the case." Kate said, seriously. 'She is not letting Ziva get to her.' Tony thought happily. He was afraid Ziva would try to berate her.

"She is right Ziva. We are working on the case." He repeated Kate's words.

"It doesn't look like it." Ziva said turning on her computer.

'She is jealous!' Kate thought. 'Well, I am not going to let her spoil my time with Tony!' She thought decisively. McGee and Gibbs entered the office, talking about the case. They both smiled once they show Kate. She smiled back and greeted them. Gibbs found himself again and asked about the case.

"I want progress people!" He ordered. "We have two dead officers and no clues."

"Actually Gibbs, that's not true." Kate said looking from Gibbs to Tony.

"Yeah, boss, we think we found something." Tony added.

"We?" Ziva asked.

"Yes, we." Kate said. "As in me and Tony." She added coldly.

"But when did you work on the case?" McGee asked. "It's only seven thirty."

"Last night, Probie." Tony said ready to tease McGee again. "Didn't you get the file of the case?"

"You were together last night?" Ziva asked venomously, before Gibbs managed to stop her.

"Well it happens when you live in the same house with someone." Tony said sternly. 'I don't like the fact that she is pushing Kate.' He thought.

Gibbs and McGee seemed to be happily surprised with the new information, Kate and Tony looked at each other adoringly and Ziva looked murderous and a tone greener. Before anyone made a comment the phone on Tony's desk rang. Tony answered;

"NCIS office, how may I help you? You are speaking with agent DiNozzo. So you did turn it on." He looked at Kate and she reached the computer locating the cell phone's signal. She found the address and showed it to Tony smiling. He smiled back, ignoring the curious looks they received from their colleagues and said; "Yes, we found it. Thank you for your cooperation." He then hang up the phone, turned to Kate and kissed her. "You were right" he said to Kate "You are a genius." He added, kissing her again.

"You are far too modest." Kate said. "Foster was your idea, so was the phone company…"

"Yeah, but if you hadn't thought about the premarital contract or the affair we wouldn't…" Tony began but was interrupted by Gibbs.

"Kate, DiNozzo, I think I said I wanted you to be professional." Gibbs said. "And do you mind explaining to us what was all that about? You might be able to communicate without words, but the rest of us need some help." He added sternly.

"Sorry boss" Tony said, not looking really remorseful. "But I think we just found the killer."


	14. Now And For The Rest Of Our Lives

Hi everybody! I have to inform you that this is going to be the last chapter of this story. There might be a sequel to this story in the future, but right now I am writing a new fic about _Twilight_. Thus, I will have to thank you all for your reviews, alerts and favorites. You guys are amazing! With no further delay, here is the next and final chapter of this story. Don't forget to review to tell me if you liked it! I hope you have enjoyed reading my story as much I have enjoyed writing it!

**DISCLAIMER;** I, sadly, don't own any of the NCIS characters mentioned in this fic.

**NOW AND FOR THE REST OF OUR LIVES.**

NCIS office building; 8 in the morning;

"Explain yourselves!" Gibbs ordered. "What do you mean you found the killer?"

"Well to be exact Gibbs," Kate answered for both of them, "we didn't find the killer, we found the killers; plural."

"Killers?" McGee asked. "There is more than one?"

"I believe that Kate just said so, Probie." Tony answered.

"Would you mind enlightening the rest of us?" Gibbs asked, starting to lose his patience. "As I said before, some of us are unable to read you thoughts…"

"Should I start?" Tony asked Kate for permission.

"Of course, Tony." Kate answered with a smile, so Tony started explaining.

"Kate and I were taking a look on the case file last night and we noticed something; the Harris couple had signed a premarital contract. If they got divorced Christina Harris got nothing. We also did a little research to her personal life and realized she has a three years long affair with her employer, Ross Foster. So, under that new light we re-checked their alibis. It seems that Miss Harris has an alibi for her husband's murder, while Foster has an alibi for Officer Davis's. We also found out that someone had used late officer's Harris cell phone to call Officer Davis the day after he died. Two hours later she was dead too." Tony explained.

"Then we formed a theory; since the cell was never recovered or found anywhere near the victim we realized that the murderer must still has it." Kate continued. "We tried to locate it ourselves, but it was turned off. So we waited till today and we called the phone company to turn it on." Kate chuckled and looked at Tony, remembering he had actually forged their director's signature. Everybody gave her a questioning look, while Tony just smirked.

"Just an inside joke…" Kate said. "Anyways, they just called and we know who has the cell; Miss Christina Harris herself. And since she had an alibi for her husband's killer she must have gotten the cell from the killer himself. We couldn't prove that Foster was the killer of course so we called him this morning and I pretended being Christina's lawyer…"

"You should see her boss." Tony said. "She has the most believable fake southern accent I have ever heard!" he exclaimed. Ziva was ready to attack Kate and had actually clenched her fists so she wouldn't hit her. Kate saw her posture, but chose to ignore her and continue with her explanation;

"Anyways, I pretend to be her lawyer and asked him if he knew if Christina had an affair. He got furious and said that he couldn't know if that was true. Afterwards he called Christina and right now he is heading to her house."

"How do you know that he called or that he is headed there?" Gibbs asked.

"I wired his cell, so I know who he calls and when. As for how we know where he is going, well that was Kate's idea; she found out Foster is using a company car that has a tracking devise. She turned the devise on and right now if you look on that screen," Tony said and motioned at the display screen "you will see his current location marked with a red dot."

"So those two have one alibi each for two different but connected murders, make profit from the murders and are romantically connected with each other. And right now they are at the same place." Gibbs effectively summarized all that had been said. Tony and Kate nodded affirmative.

"Then why are we still here?" Gibbs asked and moved to the elevator. The agents got the message and followed him quickly out of the door, Ziva trying to tackle Kate on the way.

Outside Christina Harris's house; 10 thirty in the morning;

The five agents had just arrived at the house and Gibbs was explaining them what they were going to do. "As you might have noticed, our case is not exactly strong against them. All the evidence we have against them is that cell phone. If we don't get it we have nothing. Also you should be careful for one more reason; both of the victims were shot. That means those two are probably armed. No reason any of you gets shot today." He added in a grave voice, momentarily looking at Kate.

'Don't worry Gibbs' Tony thought 'I am not letting her get hurt. Not this time.'

"So we are going to arrest them?" McGee asked.

"That's the plan." Gibbs said. "It's actually simple, so stick to it!" He ordered, looking suspiciously at Tony.

"Don't worry Gibbs." Tony said out loud this time. "I'll do my best to behave." He promised smirking.

"All right then, move it people, we don't have all day." Gibbs ordered. They all exited the car and moved towards the house. Gibbs reached the door first and rang the bell. After he got no answer, he tried again while screaming; "NCIS open now!" he then turned to Tony and motioned him to open the door. With one shove, the road was clear for them. They all entered the house and started checking the rooms.

"I hear something from the upper floor." Ziva said and they all started climbing the stairs to the second floor. They started checking the rooms when Tony saw the worst thing he could ever imagine. Foster was holding a gun and pointed it at Kate. Everything felt like in slow motion; he saw McGee arresting Christina Harris and Foster getting ready to pull the trigger. He acted instinctively; he shoved Kate out of the path of the bullet, while at the same time shooting at Foster. He knew he had hit him. And he knew he was hit; he could tell by the pain he felt on his left shoulder. He fell backwards the moment he heard Kate screaming his name. He could feel her coming closer and collecting him in her arms.

"Tony! Please baby look at me! Say something!" Kate screamed at him. Tony really wanted to talk; he just couldn't find the strength to do so. Black spots started forming in the corner of his eyes, blocking his view. He tried to make them go away. He knew he was soon going to be unconscious soon, but he, childishly, didn't want to lose sight of Kate's face. 'She is crying.' Tony thought 'She shouldn't be. At least she is safe, that is all that maters.' He heard Gibbs screaming at his cell for an ambulance. He heard Probie mumbling incoherently to Ziva. And of course, he could also hear Kate whispering to him;

"Please Tony, I beg of you, don't die on me… Please don't die." Tony could feel her rocking his body back and forth. He felt something warm on his cheeks but he was to dizzy to realize it was Kate's tears. The last thing he heard before the darkness claimed him was her voice whispering;

"Please Tony don't die… I love you so much…"

'And I love you Kate.' Tony thought and slipped into unconsciousness.

Two days later; Hospital room; 11 in the morning;

Tony was trying to open his eyes, but he couldn't get his eyelids to obey. He tried to remember why he couldn't open his eyes. He remembered arriving at Christina Harris's house and Gibbs giving them a lecture about what they were going to do. He had promised to be careful, he remembered that much. And then he remembered Foster aiming at Kate and what he had done to save her. 'Kate.' He thought. 'Wake up for Kate!' Tony ordered himself.

He could now feel that someone was laying his head on his bed and the same someone was holding his hand. It was a smaller hand than his and he could have recognized it anywhere. Her scent was also in the air, now that he had started recognizing scents again. He finally got his eyelids to obey and looked at her. Kate was sitting on a chair near him with her head on his bed, sleeping. 'She looks stressed out even in sleep' Tony realized. He turned his head around and realized that he was in some short of a hospital room. His movement, even if it was almost unnoticeable, proved enough to wake Kate up.

"Tony you are awake!" She shrieked and hugged him tightly, making him whimper. She had unwillingly applied a bit more pressure than he would like on his wound.

"Kate I am thrilled to see you too," Tony said, his voice soft, "but do you think you could not suffocate me to death? I need to breathe in order to survive you know…" Kate let go of him like she was struck by lightning and quickly said;

"Tony I'm so sorry! I should have been more careful not only now but back in that house too… You could have died." She said and her voice cracked as she started crying. "Do you even realize how I felt when I saw you hurt? What was I ever going to do if you… if you died, because of me?"

"Come on now Kate. Don't cry. I'm fine, you are fine, the bad guys are in jail… come to think of it, are they in jail?" Tony asked, trying to diverse the conversation from the subject of his demise. It worked, since Kate whipped her tears and said;

"Yes, they are in jail all right. Once Gibbs made sure you were going to make it he got back and interrogated them; I have never seen him so angry. Both of them where crying their eyes out by the tome they confessed. We were right in case you are interested; Foster killed Officer Harris and Christina Harris killed Officer Davis. They said they sent the parts in the boxes in order to make us believe this was the work of psycho killer…" She explained.

"Well, they are not completely sane themselves, so I guess the got the 'psycho' part right…" Tony said, making Kate laugh, besides the tears that were once again falling from her eyes. "Hey! What did I say about crying?" he asked Kate.

"Yeah I know, it's just… the doctors said that you had lost a lot of blood. The bullet missed all organs but it did hit an artery. If we were a few more minutes late you wouldn't have make it. Don't you see?" Kate asked, close to an emotional breakdown. "You would have been dead because of me!"

"No, Kate! None of that!" Tony said seriously as he reached with his right hand to touch her face. "Foster is the one who shot me, you did nothing wrong. He came from behind you, from a room we hadn't checked yet. You couldn't have known where he was." He said and then added; "As for me, I am glad I pushed you out of harms way and I would do it again happily."

"But…" Kate tried to protest.

"Look, Kate I know what it feels like to be without you and I don't want to have to go through it again. Frankly, I don't think I would make it if I lost you again and to your information I don't intend to find out. I love you Kate." He said. Kate looked at him trying to realize if what she had just heard was the truth or not.

"And I love you Tony. More than I ever thought was possible. Even if in the beginning you got on my nerves…" Kate said, making Tony laugh. "And that's why I want you to promise me that you will never do something like that again. To your information I don't believe I could live without you either." She added.

"Just to make everything clear, do you want me to sit back and do nothing the next time some crazy guy tries to shoot you?" Tony asked. "Sorry, but no. I can't promise you that. I will always try to protect you, no mater what." Just looking at him, Kate could tell that he meant every word he said.

"Can you at least promise that you won't die on me?" Kate asked.

"As a mater of fact, I'm planning to stay with you for quite a long time, if you are willing to take me of course." Tony answered. Kate just smiled and pulled him in for a hug. Tony felt the pain in his shoulder intensifying, but he couldn't care less. "I take this as a yes." He said joking.

"You'd better!" Kate said and kissed him. Tony kissed her back not caring that his colleagues were at the moment looking though the door into his room or about anything else in the world. All that mattered to him was in his arms in that hospital room and he was unwilling to ever let go.

'I will do everything to make sure we will be together Kate.' Tony thought. 'Now and for the rest of our lives.'

**-THE END-**


End file.
